Undergraduate Seismic Design Competition

The weekend of April 29, four UIUC undergraduate students (Laurie Kraft, Soon Sim Go, Matthew Streid, and Jian Li) plus one graduate student (Joseph Shields) represented the MAE Center at the PEER Student Leadership Council sponsored Undergraduate Seismic Design Competition held at the University of California, Berkeley. The four undergraduate students spent the previous month designing and building a balsa wood structure to enter in the competition and to be tested using earthquake ground motions from both the Kobe and Northridge earthquakes. Teams were judged on structural performance, prediction, construction cost, workmanship, and architectural style. Although the MAE Center team did not place overall, they received first place in style and construction cost. In the end, the judges argued the competition unfairly favored those teams with base isolation and mentioned they were very impressed with the unique MAE Center design. Overall the undergraduate students learned a great deal about seismic design and performance and had an educational and fun experience in California. To a view a video clip of the MAE team at the competition, visit the website at http://peer.berkeley.edu/~mgebman/SLCseismicComp.html.