Since my last update we have completed the install of the Library Project in its final position, as a result of this, the Hospital Project has taken a back seat. It is now unknown when the Hospital Project will be installed due to the onset of the coronavirus. The completion of the Library Project has involved overcoming a few quite technical, unexpected problems; and design revisions on the look of final parts. I will therefore go through component by component to some extent and discuss the relevant problems that have been overcome.
First is the Board which goes behind the doorbells. This has evolved from being labels that are laser cut individually to a single laser cut piece that goes between the doorbells and the wooden surround of the installation. The design was made and iterated on in Adobe Illustrator before being engraved. The first engravings were made in cheaper wood rather than expending £30 per sheet acrylic.
Wooden surround for doorbells
This was the same process I followed when prototyping and cutting the plaque which explains the project which is also mounted to the wall beside the installation. This plaque uses a different version of the acrylic that is black underneath with a reflective metallic texture foil on the surface. This material, unlike the red covered acrylic, displayed strange artifacts when it was engraved, with ghosts of the letters appearing to the sides of the engraved letters. After several tests it was realised that the laser of the laser cutter did not switch completely off when not engraving the letters as we would have expected. This caused it to make slight engravings where it changed direction as those were the places where the laser was moving slowest so it had more time to affect the material. We also discovered that the laser still slightly engraves the material during the focusing and positioning the start point of the laser which was also disturbing. We eventually solved the problem by having the machine engrave a line either side of the piece that would be cut, increasing the time taken but ensuring that the artifacts occurred outside of the boundaries of the cut plaque.
Strange markings on delicate multi layer acrylic.
Concurrently, the surround for the installation was also being constructed in-situ in a room behind the wall that would be the final location for the installation. We had two excellent carpenters who constructed most of the wall in a few short days. I volunteered to paint the thing one night, staying up into the small hours, applying several coats in between trips to get food and hang out with a friend of mine in New Cross.
The final stages then were to attach all of the individual objects that had been created along the way, and to lock the whole thing into position, this job was also done by the carpenters. What remains then was to playtest the installation.
The finished installation