Alec Burk - UNL Spring 2020 Architecture

Alec A. Burk

Spring 2020 Portfolio

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Curriculum Vitae Alec Burk

Education secondary: Chadron Senior High School higher: University of Nebraska Lincoln -B.S. Architecture -current 2nd year Master’s -expected graduation: May 8th, 2020

Interests t: 308-430-3007 e: alec.burk95@gmail.com a: 4305 N 1st St. apt 328 Lincoln, NE 68521 lnkdin: /in/alec-burk dob: 5/30/1995 age: 24 hometown: Chadron, NE

Software

Work Experience UNL Architecture Hall Woods and Metal Shop Attendant Aug 2018 - Present Contact Matthew Bukrey: 605-321-8394 Window installation- Nebraskaland Siding and Windows Summer 2018 Contact Steve Bauerkemper: 402-499-4940 Autozone April 2017 - Aug 2018 Contact Ben Holen: 402-802-4417 Highlands Golf Course Grounds and Maintenance Summer 2016 & 17 Contact Jeff Gasseling: 402-440-5791 Chadron State College Grounds and Maintenance Summer 2014 & 15 Contact Harry Mowry: 605-786-5887

01 Tensile Fabrication Center Arch411 Spring2018

Partner: Griffin Thomas

Robotic fabrication is an emerging technology with the goal of creating the most accurate and precise forms of construction in any industry.

In conjunction with UNL Innovation Campus, we were staged to create an emerging technology center with classrooms, faculty offices, and a robotics lab.

We started linking different user groups by creating smaller learning communities within the building to encourage a closer faculty to student relationship and easier direct communication. These learning communities would be encompassed by faculty offices, a classroom, a study room, and collaborative room.

The link is also created through research labs and a robotics lab in which faculty and students can bring their projects to life. The public is also welcome to the ground floor of the building that includes the robotics lab, a community lecture hall and seating for studying, meetings or relaxing.

Floor Plate Connection: The carbon fiber cables are suspended from a track system embedded into the space frame.

A closed loop attachment point occurs at the track system and at the C-channel where the cables connect to the floor.

Thicker cables are used every three feet to attach to the I-beams in the floor plates. The smaller, thinner cables simply attach to the top of the C-channel and serve the purpose of support and privacy. Areas where more privacy is needed, like the learning communities, cables are more dense and in open spaces, like the lobby, cables are less apparent. A glass railing is placed behind the cables for safety and radient floor heating is embedded within the poured concrete sitting on metal decking.

Cable Net Facade: Our curtain walls are thermally insulated glass panels that attach at their corners to a stainless steal plate. Those plates are anchored back to a cable system that hold the glass panels in place. The cables are made of twined carbon fiber which has a tensile strength twice that of steel allowing for a much thinner appearance. The twining process would be conducted in the robotic lab where fabrication could occur on site. The cables are anchored to a footing in the floor below and to the bottom cord of the space frame above. A fire-proof coating is applied to the exterior of the cables to ensure protection.

Geothermal Fields: Heat is piped underground from a nearby water treatment center providing the building with non-fossil fuel dependent energy. This heat is then distributed in the floor plates through radient heating.

Space Frame Connection: The carbon fiber cable is looped around the bottom space frame cord with tabs on either side of the cable to prevent sliding. Extra space frame cords are added where vertical cables don’t hit a normal space frame member.

Wall and Floor Section

Baseline FirstLocation Floor Plan Daylight Analysis Optimization - The study is conducted along the west facade of the building to analyze daylighting.

Current Annual Daylight - The west facade of the robotic lab receives slightly too much light in the space.

Current Radiation Map - The spaces receive direct west light into the space making it extremely prone to heat gain.

Optimized Study - Cables are denser on the first floor of the building and lighter on the second floor.

Summer Solstice = Aprox. 72 degrees

Summer Solstice = Aprox. 72 degrees

Equinox = Aprox. 50 degrees

Equinox = Aprox. 50 degrees

Winter Solstice = Aprox. 25 degrees

Winter Solstice = Aprox. 25 degrees

Structural Analysis X-axis Deformation

Study 1 - Cables are placed minimally along the exterior of the facade allowing too much light into the space.

Structural Analysis X-axis Visualization

Structural Analysis Y-axis Deformation

Structural Analysis Z-axis Deformation

Study 2 - Cables are placed densely across the portion of the building and minimally across the top.

Study 3 - Cables are denser and evenly distributed between first and second floor facade.

Structural Analysis Y-axis Visualization

Structural Analysis Z-axis Load Deformation

Study 4 - Cables are moved at an angle creating an extreme hot and cold area if ever need by the user group.

Structural Analysis Z-axis Visualization

Structural Analysis Z-axis Load Visualization

Structural Analysis The overhang of the space frame provides passive shading strategies during the peak temperatures of the year. This positively impacts the building by reducing heat from being gained through our large cable net glass facades.

Shading and Passive Heating

June 21th Summer Solstice = Aprox. 72 degrees

The polyurethane translucent facade on the exterior of the space frame also blocks light from reaching farther into the building.

Nebraska can see extremely hot summers so passive shading strategies become very important.

March 20th Equinox = Aprox. 50 degrees

During the winter months, the angle of the sun reaches deep into the space providing passive heating strategies into the room warming up the space. This decreases heating costs lowering the carbon footprint of the building.

December 21th Winter Solstice = Aprox. 25 degrees

02 Hous(ing) Matters Arch510 Fall2018

This studio explored various building types, investigated their formative parameters, and experimented with normative and speculative configurations. We looked at serial architecture, a small series of singlefamily houses, as a distributed strategy for urban redevelopment and densification.

The studio collaborated with NeighborWorks Lincoln, South of Downtown Community Organization, Lincoln Planning Department, and Sinclair Hille Architects.

The site chosen was an open lot on the North side of Schmick’s Market in the Belmont neighborhood of Lincoln. The west third of the site resides in a flood plain.

Rather than building the site up out of the plain, the single-family homes are raised on stilts similar to those in hurricane territory.

The form of each home combines the shotgun and camel-back style. They are rotated perpendicular to maximize the number of housing units.

Site Plan

Form Diagram

Level 1

Level 2

Section Perspective Side Elevation

Section Perspective Front Elevation

03 Design-Build

Arch511 Spring2019

Partners: Ian Jones, Kyra Stradley

Mizer’s Ruin Cedar Point Biological Station, located on the shore of Lake Ogallala, serves as a research and experiential classroom for UNL’s School of Biological Sciences. The site for the cabin sits 30’ vertically up the hill from the station and will act as a retreat for Associate Director Jon Garbish, who we worked hand in hand with the entire semester.

The cabin, titled Mizer’s Ruin, consists of two 10x10’ cubes intersecting at the corners with a 3 foot overlap. The cubes are split up into a bedroom/bathroom and a living/kitchen area and minimize space and footprint.

To keep with the theme of the station, the cabin will use minimally invasive construction techniques and replace the ground taken with a prairie grass green roof. Construction consists of a series of simple cuts and joints using the available equipment on site and can be done with minimal prior carpentry experience.

Finally, to set the cabin apart from the rest of those on site, the method of weatherproofing and sealing through burning known as shou sugi ban will applied to the exterior of the logs after construction.

Render by Ian Jones

Elevation by Ian Jones

Site Information

Sections by Ian Jones

Floor Plan

Sections by Ian Jones

Along with the drawings and construction documents, we were tasked with creating a full-scale mock-up of our proposed cabin.

Each and every piece of this model was hand made, from the window and door, to the green roof and all the flashing.

We also took a torch and burnt the mock up like it would be during construction, and finished the char with a hose down and oil finish to seal in the char.

The mock-up is currently installed at UNL’s Prairie Pines east of Lincoln to test the limits of the jointery and water proofing.

04 Design-Build Arch610 Fall2019

Partners: Aron B, Alfredo Vera

Shift Shelter The premise of this design build project was to “Make Nothing.” Make nothing refers to designing the ordinary in a new way, the simple with a hidden object to be revealed, and using the surrounding context and history as an influence and inspiration.

With the Homestead National Monument in Beatrice, NE as our site, we narrowed these influential pieces down to barns and agriculture, while also keeping with the theme of the Homestead Act of 1862.

The form of the picnic shelter is derived from three common barn profiles, mono-pitch or lean-to as the exterior shell, and a subtracted interior that starts at a gable profile on one side, and morphs to a gambrel on the other. This seemingly “ordinary” exterior and hidden surprise on the interior creates a “Huh, WOW” moment for users.

The shelter acts as both a picnic shelter, and as a resting point for travelers or bicyclists on a proposed trail. It is oriented to act as a continuation of the path through the site and to frame views of the pond just to the South.

The Shift Shelter is a continuing project for my independent study and will hopefully break ground at the end of the Summer 2020.

Round Hip

Gambrel

A-Frame Monitor Gable Roof

Gable

Quonset

Mono-Pitch Roof

Barn Highway Diagram

Form Diagram

Morphology Diagram

Plain Facade

Morphology Diagram

Gambrel Roof

  SUMMER SUN

Cap ( Metal Sheet) Standing Seam Roof

Roof Purlin

Purlin 3 1/2’’ x 1 3/4’’ Brace ( 5 1/2’’ X 1 3/4’’ )

Aluminium Gutter

Column

Brace ( 5 1/2 X 1 3/4 ) Slat Column

Brace ( 3 1/2’’ X 1 3/4’’ )

3 21 ''

5 21 ''

1'-3''

1'-3''

5 21 ''

3 21 ''

WINTER SUN

5 21 ''

1'-3''

3 21 ''

Wood Column Self Tapping Screw 3/4'' Plate Knife

1’ - 8’’

1/2'' Anchor Bolt

Concrete Foundation

5'

1’-3’’

Concrete Slab

Aggregate

2’ -1’’

Soil

2'

0

Detail GA Section by Aron B.

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05 Wood Working

Ply-Wave Plywood gives the finished look of a hardwood at a fraction of the cost. But when the surface layer is compromised, the plywood deteriorates both physically and visually, revealing the less than perfect layers underneath. With time and effort, these flaws can be buffed and polished to be even more beautiful than before. It just takes a little work.

Steel-Ash Makeup Desk This vanity desk is made of a live-edge, white ash slab, steel strips and square tube. The steel strips were bent with a torch and to a height that could be used as both a bench and, when the square tubing is bolted in, as a makeup desk. Because of the simple design and assembly, the desk is able to be broken down and flat packed easily for storage or moving.

Ash Contour Stool The stool is used in a multitude of applications from education to bars, yet, is often extremely uncomfortable to sit for long periods of time.

The Contour stool seat was hand carved from a solid ash log and dry jointed to a refurbished beech-wood stool. This stool is just one attempt at creating a more form-fitting and comfortable alternative to the stool.

Pillow-Top Stool This product design project was a second run at improving the stool. Similar to the previous, the Pillow-Top Stool is a contoured seat designed, but instead, is specific to the user. The seat is constructed of a vacuum bag filled with foam beads that form to the user when the air is pulled from the bag via a small pump. The stool itself is made of white ash, and dry jointed together with hand-drilled ash dowels. This stool is still on going with plans for using expanding foam in the future.

Thank You