UNM Instillations Committee Spring 2023 Fiestas Entryway Project

Every spring ASUNM the school’s student activities organization puts on a music festival in Johnson Field. The project was sponsored by ASUNM and was installed in the venue to function as an entry into the event. This project was on a budget of $2500 and the event was on April 1st giving us three months to design, fabricate and assemble the project before the first.

Design Considerations: The structure had to support itself over the course of 48 hours. Keeping safety in mind with this being a student event and not wanting any injuries to happen over the course of fabrication, installation and during the event. The structure had to be inviting for event goers to take pictures and interact with it. Ease of assembly and the ability to break down the structure. We wanted to incorporate a variety of transparent colors. We also wanted to have as large of a structure as possible to push our fabrication abilities.

Initial Concept: Was the idea of a gate or portal to transfer people into the festival and set the mental image for the event. The first idea was a set of semicircles triangle arches that would each be a different color and a radius of around 15’. We decided on a construction method of a steel inner frame and acrylic panel skin. With our skin material coming in sizes of 2’ by 4’ the decision was made to build a module that could be repeated. The second version of the design was to segment the arches into blocks keeping the full arch idea. At this stage we had a solid design concept. After getting some material quotes, we realized that we had enough money to make 16 modular pieces. An idea came up that we could separate the arch in half giving us 4 half arches that could be fixed together. The updated and finalized design was a four-segment half arch with connecting bars that alternated.

Construction: The steel frame was made from 1’ square box tube with metal welded on struts that the acrylic was bolted on to. Each acrylic piece had two holes drilled on each end that matched up the struts.  To connect each module together we plasma cut brackets that would be screwed together. The team worked the week before welding all the components together and everything was ready to be assembled. The event was planned to start Saturday morning with our goal of completing all metal fabrication Thursday. ASUNM had scheduled volunteers to help assemble the structure Friday afternoon with around 50 students that came and went we were able to get everything up without any real issues. The initial plan worked ok with a few adjustments.

Conclusion: During design we knew that wind could be a factor in the wither, the structure would survive, and the day of construction was the windiest day and it made it through the weekend without any issues. It was disassembled and recycled. Most of the material was donated back to the Fab Lab in the architecture building for future student use. One segment was reconstructed in the building as a display of student work.