The Bridge Blog
A dialog about our new bridge and these web pages
Overview. As a pointy-headed
university professor, my weekend project of bridge photography and
building these web pages generated many questions and introduced me
to just-in-time learning. I enjoy chasing my curiosity and
want to identify ways to encourage younger learners to also enjoy curiosity
chasing and learning.
Learning usually requires repetition while forgetting occurs when
I infrequently use information. Many young learners do not understand
the importance of repetition. Weekly visits to the bridge provided
the repetition necessary to detect changes in the bridge and
consequently generated
many questions and opportunities for learning. Over the course of the
bridge project, I had access to few experts for answering questions.
Rather than a liability, this became an asset and pushed me to improve
my search skills with Google. Soon, I found that answers
to questions encountered during my weekly photo shoots were often
only a Google-search away -
(see
Restoring the Joy in Learning). Consequently Google + Internet became
dependable extensions of my memory.
The bridge story is a work in progress and is evolving from a simple
collections of photographs to an experiment with Internet-centric
just-in-time learning.
Insights I gain from you
will find their way into the learning centers of MUSC.
Palmetto Bridge Constructors, a joint venture between
Tidewater
Skanska and
Flatiron Constructors, as well as
High Steel Structures,
Freyssinet, the
SCDOT and the
Federal Highway Commission Office
of Bridge Technology guided much of my learning.
I also learn from many of you and from Google-linked resources. More
important is the e-mail encouragement I receive from many of you.
Wed, 09 Mar 2005
March 9, 2005: Making ends meet (my wife wishes she could use hydraulic jacks and fork lifts to deal with family budget issues).
Closing the last gap (maybe last gasp?). Yesterday PBC and their iron
workers closed the final gap linking the west and east decks. Peo and his team
coaxed the two platforms into perfect alignment so that the splice plate could
be pinned and bolted. Shown here is driving the first drift pin into the
vertical splice plate linking the center edge girder with the south 216
edge girder.
It was windy - really very windy. I discovered that the virtue of an
8 lane wide roadway is that when the wind blows your glasses - it takes a long
time to cover the width of the road and disappear. Fortunately I quickly
retrieved them. But in spite of the wind, the work continued.
I soon discovered some of the tricks these guys use to encourage the two decks
to behave and align themselves. Two major tools:
- Altering the horizontal alignment with hydraulic jacks (located at the
pylon).
- Altering the vertical alignment with counterweights. In this case,
the counterweights were mobile - consisting of fork lifts that moved toward
or away from the gap, with or without counterweights.
I would not have
thought changing the alignment a few inches would be so involved - and yet
relatively straight forward. It was a joy to watch this team do their magic!.
Today they are completing bolting up the vertical splice plates and horizontal
splice plates.
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