Inspired by the ritual of crossing the Sallyport of Lovett Hall during matriculation here at Rice University, we decided to make a model of students of stages cycling through our iconic Sallyport to represent the journey of the Rice Student.

Pt I: Planning

Initially, we had a ton of Ideas, and couldn’t decide what to do. So, we made a huge list of all our ideas and ranked them accordingly based on difficulty and creativity. The Cycle of a Rice Student won, and then we proceeded to make a sketch of what we envisioned it to look like on paper, then Fusion 360, and then Solidworks. 

Design Ranking

Pt 2: Sally Port

We decided early on that something that would be very cool to do is to make a realistic (as we possibly could) model of Sallyport. However, a layer of complexity was added by the fact that we were required to make everything press fit.

First, we made a sketch of Lovett Hall in its entire glory, using Adobe Illustrator. I used the dimensions Sophia had calculated and tried to make something resembling our beloved Lovett Hall. Next, it was time to tackle the actual structure.

To make things easier, we split Lovett Hall into three separate boxes and used the Box Generator Website to make each section. Then, after a long while of staring at Dr. Wettergreen’s prototyping library, and playing with tolerances and kerf settings we figured out how to make the boxes press fit into each other.  Because our model was going to be about 9 inches tall and 20 inches wide, we initial made a smaller model, just to make sure we knew what we were doing if there were things to learn in the process, without wasting wood. It took several rounds of iterating until we finally got a result we were pleased with.

I then made files to laser cut 3D elements to add depth and realism to sally port. Including a set of finger joint fences, columns, and archways. Sophia also joined in and made little plaques, windows and a roof. Adding all these textural elements really helped bring Lovett Hall to life. 

Sally Port Features

Next, I tackled the floating busts we have spinning around the model. I found some hi-resolution photos online, and then imported them to Illustrator to trace. I had also made little outfits to go with them: a suit for the underclassmen and a graduation gown for the senior, However as shown in this picture here, it was way too big to fit in our arches, so we scrapped their outfits all together 🙁 and made them tinier. 

Initial Design

Design Modeled to Scale

Making the actual building Sallyport, was ten times easier after making the smaller model. It was essentially a process of, generate files, laser cut, assemble, repeat. However things got very tricky when making the platform for Sallyport shown below. We had some weird reflections that we didn’t account for initially and so the first couple of cuts were wrong for reasons we figured out and then fixed, only for us to re cut it and spot another thing we hadn’t taken into account. The wood was also badly warped so it added some tension to Sallyport and things were not fitting as they should. We fixed this by gluing it to a straighter piece of wood and clamping. Voila Sallyport!

Clamping Sallyport Together

Pt 2.2: Mechanics

Most of our project time was spent planning. It was very important that all the gears and people aligned correctly with Lovett Hall. After we determined our concept, we knew that we wanted to use Mechanism 55: planetary gears. We planned the actual size of Lovett Hall using cardboard, and designed our model in Solidworks based on our real world measurements.

Cardboard Sallyport and Paper Calculations

Our mechanism included three gears, with the first gear directly actuated by our crank. The third gear (from the first gear) is directly connected to the central sun gear of a planetary gearbox which holds four planetary gears on which the four Rice students rest. 

Solidworks Designing

Cutting the Gears

After all our files were ready to cut, we made sure we tested the correct tolerance setting to ensure that the gears press fit to our dowels and our bearings press fit in our wood. We found that the smallest holes worked best for press fitting. 

Tolerance Test

We then cut a 1:2 scaled down version of our planetary gear box. This version illuminated any inconsistencies that we may have missed in our cardboard version and ensured that we didn’t waste any material in our final cutting.

Cardboard Version and Small Laser-Cut Version

We then cut the final versions of our gears: 

 

Finalized Gears

They fit perfectly! 

Once our gears were finished, we cut the platforms:

Bottom of Top Platform

The top platform consists of two sheets of wood: the bottom sheet, which connects to the dowels and the planetary gear box, and the top sheet, which connects to Lovett Hall. 

We connected the gearbox to the bottom half of the top platform, and ensured all the gears aligned.  

The bottom platform also consisted of two sheets, both of which held the dowels and housed the bottom gear system. We performed many test cuts to ensure that the bearing’s surface was flush with the platform. We found that 25s and 100p made it so the bearings were offset roughly 3 mm into the bottom platform piece, so that they were flush with the top of the platform.

Test Cuts and Flush Gears

Once our mechanism was finalized, we were ready to connect Lovett Hall and the mechanics together. 

Making the Metal Handle 

We wanted to cut a handle that was unobtrusive, but also followed with our model’s connection to Rice University. Therefore, our handle went through two main processing steps: plasma cutting and laser engraving. With the plasma cutter, we cut the main shape of our handle:

Then, we angle grinded and sandblasted the handle.

To align the laser cutter properly with the handle, we designed a jig to hold the part. The jig included a border engraving, with which we could correlate the real-world position of the laser with the position on the printing software. 

After several pass throughs, we had a beautifully engraved Rice “R” on our handle!

Vinyl and Finishing

A Tomi and Sophia project cannot be completed without a splash of the gorgeous white stain. So we did exactly that, giving a very subtle finish without taking away the wood look we wanted to maintain with our model.

All the vinyl at the OEDK is either black or a very intense Saturated primary color. That did not at all fit the vibe, and so we had to get creative here. Since Vinyl is just plastic, we cut out our pieces and spray painted them a metallic gold (to match the white stain.) and gave it a glossy clear coat to make it reflective. The vinyl stickers went on the 3d columns, and archways to emphasize the regalness we wanted the project to have. 

Spray Painting the Cut Vinyl

Pt 3 Putting it all together

Now it was time to put everything together. It was for sure not as easy as we thought it would be. Things snapped, glue got everywhere, the laser cutter was fully booked , things didn’t fit, last minute changes were made. However we got it done, and isn’t she beautiful:

Google Slide Presentation: https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1pBq9hxG_QO61XQyFAUOcWn3_tQrQaiPF7WKxvfQ7ix0/edit?usp=sharing

Video File: Midterm Working