For the Chicago centennial celebration, the Chicago Architecture Foundation planned a model city that will be the centerpiece of the citywide Burnham 1909 Plan of Chicago celebration. The exhibition will help visitors explore the planning of Chicago to encourage understanding of how cities affect individual lives, shape regions, investigate urban life-changing ideas, and inspire people to imagine the future of Chicago and other metropolitan areas. The Chicago Model City will fill the atrium of the Santa Fe Building, June 11 through November 20, 2009. The scale of the highly detailed model is 1 inch to 50 feet, making the Sears Tower nearly three feet tall.
By December 2008, the various companies involved had developed this model of Chicago.
Experienced model designers, Chicago-based Columbian Model & Exhibit Works, chose rapid prototyping as the best way to create the model. After constructing accurate digital models of each building, rivers, and roads, the modelers helped assemble and prepare the data for the sterolithography equipment that would create each part.
Baxter International and DSM Somos® donated staff time, expertise, machinery, and materials to the project. Using technology to make model buildings out of a plastic resin provided by DSM Somos®. Experienced in stereolithography, local manufacturer Molex Inc., created several buildings for the model. Large buildings like the Merchandise Mart took two days to complete.
One of the materials used was the WaterShed® XC resin, a low viscosity liquid photopolymer that produces strong, tough, water-resistant, ABS-like parts. These parts are nearly colorless, and look more like true clear-engineered plastic. The viscosity is ~260 cps at 30° C, with a density of ~1.12 g/cm3 at 25° C.
The chemistry platform produces parts with water resistance and high dimensional stability, a feature that enabled the modelers to develop an accurate rendering of the city.
Said Vince Adams, marketing manager for DSM Somos, “We were happy to donate our materials and resources.
The Somos WaterShed XC material created buildings with outstanding detail and stability, and were easy to finish and paint.”
The Chicago model will be a permanent legacy for the city. It focuses on downtown Chicago and spanning areas that include proposed Olympic sites, and will be a compelling selling point in showcasing Chicago and Illinois in the global arena.
The Chicago model is based on the recently constructed models of Beijing and Shanghai – the first cities to create a new generation of large-scale city models. These city models serve as major tourism destinations. In the summer of 2007, CAF leadership met with Mayor Daley to discuss plans for CAF to support Chicago in the Olympic bid. Mayor Daley, who has viewed the city models of Beijing and Shanghai, expressed strong interest in creating a model as a marketing tool for securing Chicago as the site for the 2016 Summer Olympics – a strategy employed by both Sydney and Beijing in their successful Olympic bids.
The Chicago Architecture Foundation (CAF)
www.architecture.org
Columbian Model & Exhibit Works, Ltd.
cmew.biz
DSM Somos
www.dsmsomos.com
Baxter International Inc.
Molex Incorporated
www.molex.com
MPF
Source: :: Make Parts Fast ::
