AMP 2020-2024 and next…

Posted on by pervasiveyaz

Dear reader,

First, our best wishes for 2024! Let’s hope this year be better than the last four – the world has faced a succession of challenging events since our last post. You have all read about the violent demolition of the scrapyard… These uncertainties have strengthened our point of view that architecture needs a complete repositioning. The next few posts will be dedicated to update you on AMP and the steps taken to develop its technology. The various events that AMP participated to were the opportunity to develop with the AMP Makers Collective (often remotely!) the architecture toolkit, which has evolved to become lighter (using less metal and more bamboo), scalar and completely customizable. Here below is a photograph taken by community agent Kay A. in 2021 of the next generation prototype made in and around Agbogbloshie.

Shuttleworth Grant Accelerates the AMP Spacecraft

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The Shuttleworth Foundation Flash Grant received in November 2016 has helped tremendously to amplify groundwork on the Agbogbloshie Makerspace Platform and the AMP spacecraft. It freed us from immediate constraints and enabled us to:

  • Upgrade the Spacecraft in Agbogbloshie
  • Prototype a new roof system
  • Devise of an action plan for the Agbogbloshie Makerspace Platform mobile application
  • And advance plans to introduce AMP at the Seoul Biennale of Architecture and Urbanism— Shipping a second prototype #MadeinAgbogbloshie of the Spacecraft and showcase grassroots makers’ production while interacting with local grassroots makers, all of this as an attempt to link and strenghten different communities of makers around the globe.

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The last months’ production, including the conversation with the Public Interest Design community met in Portland (AMP won the SEED Award 2017), are ground work to our next phase of AMP, which is to prototype a sustainable and viable business model so the Spacecraft operates in autonomous manner in a variety of grassroots communities.

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Thank you to the Shuttleworth Foundation, Ugo Vallauri and Janet Gunter co-founders of the Restart Project and the Restart Project community.

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2016 Summary, Welcome 2017!

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Dear AMPers,

A happy new year from the AMP team!

2016 was rich in milestones and interclass innovation workshops to advance makers and development objectives:

The 2016 trip team, led by Sell and Christie Jiang, also a junior, split into three groups to tackle filming and editing. Each group focused on different topic areas – like copper burning(link is external), working with lead batteries(link is external), or the health hazards of aluminum(link is external). The students worked closely with on-the-ground support from AMP to meet and interview workers and community leaders at Agbogbloshie and better understand the complex workings of the scrapyard. (via Princeton University)

We are now ready for 2017 and looking forward to meeting you again for more special maker and interclass innovation events…

Best Regards,

The AMP Team

Share this video with a maker you know.

Let us know how you would want to contribute to the project.

Email us at info@qamp.net

AMP it up ;-)

Download & 3E-Manuals

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Download from a selection of 3E-Manuals (Electrical & Electronic Equipment) here below. You can also do a keyword search using the search bar or browse the cloud of tags. Enjoy making and let us know any edits to amplify this initial work. We look forward to hear from you: info@qamp.net!

(A long-term goal of the AMP digital platform ~qampnet~ is to digitize material reality and better position automation to assist with ambiance creation. A first step is to help make people aware of what is inside their devices and equipment.)

& 3e-manuals _draft09

Air Conditioner [Front & Back]
qamp.net/tag/ac/
Search @qampnet: air conditioner

& 3e-manuals _draft29

Computer Desktop [Front & Back]
qamp.net/tag/computer/
Search @qampnet: computer

& 3e-manuals _draft24

Microwave oven [Front & Back]
qamp.net/tag/microwave/
Search @qampnet: microwave oven

& 3e-manuals _draft04

Mobile Phone [Front & Back]
qamp.net/tag/mobile-phone/
Search @qampnet: mobile phone

& 3e-manuals _draft34

Plastics [Front & Back]
qamp.net/tag/plastics/
Search @qampnet: plastic

& 3e-manuals _draft15

Refrigerator [Front & Back]
qamp.net/tag/fridge/
Search @qampnet: fridge or refrigerator

& 3e-manuals _draft29

Monitor CRT [Front & Back]
qamp.net/tag/monitor/
Search @qampnet: tv

& 3e-manuals _draft20

Washing Machine [Front & Back]
qamp.net/tag/washing-machine/
Search @qampnet: washing machine

More on spacecrafting:

spacecraft_rev2

HOW TO SPACECRAFT
https://qamp.net/tag/spacecraft/

Makers and Development

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1_M&D Logo

M&D derives as a term from a series of design research seminars conducted at l’École Spéciale d’Architecture (2013-2015), which opened students to participation in a group project to challenge the consequences of technological dependence by remaking Agbogbloshie T.A.Z. conceptually: proposing tools to better equip the dynamic territory that operates outside the bounds, hosting technology’s unmaking and reconstitution. Spaces of unmaking inherently anticipate spaces of remaking; in Agbogbloshie at the end and restart of product life cycles the mantra reduce, re-use, repair, recycle forges its own logic. M&D operates via emphasis on making: each loop of conceptual iteration necessitates another prototype, so participants inherently discover knowledge through the making process. In the case of AMP, the community of makers includes a diverse collection of individuals working not only in Agbogbloshie (e.g. computer repair and refurbishment workshops, small-scale aluminum smelters) but also situated adjacent in the Accra Timber Market (e.g. the carpentry, metalworking, tinsmithy and equipment manufacturers) and distributed further afield (roadside electronics repairers, mechanics, welders, glaziers, furniture craftsmen, seamstresses and tailors city-wide) who make and repair items for a living. (Osseo-Asare and Abbas, 2015)

Makers & Development (M&D) design research seminar at l’Ecole Spéciale d’Architecture, Fall 2015: ABDELKADOUS, Mouna + BONGARD, Tomas + BUREL, Clara + CANADAS, MEGIA Pilar + El SOKARY, Amin + FICINI, Elisa + GUIRARD, Vincent + JIAZHEN, Lin + KENNEDY, Laura + KIERZKWOWSKA-KLYS, Maria + KSIKES, Amine + LEFEBVRE, Isabelle + Le NAY, Erwan + ORTEGA, Carla + MIYAJI, Karin + MORBELLI, Delna + POUMAILLEUX, Alexis + SORTES, Thibault + STEPHENS, Amanda + TIBOURKI, Al Mahdi

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Makers & Development (M&D) design research seminar at l’Ecole Spéciale d’Architecture, Spring 2015: BASTIAN, Hadrien + CHAOUKI, Sarah + CHEHAB, Hussein + DIENG,  Dior + ESPEJO FERNANDEZ, Adrien, HABIS, Tara + HENRY, Arthur + KHOURY-KLINK, Monica + KOMAR,  Anna + LETINTURIER, Mathieu + PEYRICHOU Ségolène + SKIBINSKI, Dominik + SOUNIGO, Eliott + VINCENT, Marine

2015-03-18 12.13.41

Makers & Development (M&D) design research seminar at l’Ecole Spéciale d’Architecture, Fall 2014: COLOMB, Gilles + MARION-ARDALAN, Cyrus + TOSTIVINT, Théo; SEBBAN, Julien; GHABRA, Hania; BALAS, Léonard + WOLF-HANSEL, Ginosar; HIGA, Akemi; KIM, Joongi + KIM, Yongyeob + KWON, Seulkee; ABREO, Daniel; VILLALBA, Joaquin

2014-10-08 11.08.04

Makers & Development (M&D) design research seminar at  l’Ecole Spéciale d’Architecture, Spring 2014: Oscar AGUILA, Nicolas BENMUSSA, Charles CLEMENT, Vlad DARABAN, Diana DURAND-RUEL, Sibylle PERRIER, Gautier PIECHOTTA, Edouard REGNIER Maryam SAAD, Ferdinand SIMON

2014-05-14 13.10.51

Makers & Development (M&D) design research seminar at  l’Ecole Spéciale d’Architecture, Fall 2013: Asaf Cem ASFUROGLU, Félix CHICOTEAU, Quentin DEJONGHE, Clément FOREST, Thomas GIROUD, Nolwenn MONTAGNY, Thomas ROBIN

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Graduate Tangi DEFACHELLES who explored the subject of e-waste and Agbogbloshie for his diploma

M&D Fall 2015

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This Fall, M&D students investigated the Kiosk Tropical, the exercise was named as such after the very well known Maison Tropicale designed by Jean Prouvé. The goal of M&D courses is to let students experience peer-to-peer / horizontal learning (what happens in makerspaces or FabLabs), understand what prototyping means and learning from prototyping, learn to create open-source manuals so others can build upon their solution, explore designing and building with as little resource as possible and with and for people with no resources (i.e. be smart with the resources at hand, i.e. contribute to the circular economy). Teams had to work on a plug-in to integrate to the frame of the spacecraft. Students had also to create an Afrofuturistic image of the solution imagined.

Students experimented with the following:

  • Prototyping a machine to make PET plastic ribbons out of plastic bottles (TIBOURKI, Al Mahdi + KSIKES, Amine)
  • Hacking a 3D printer to be able to 3D print using PET plastic ribbons made out of plastic bottles (ABDELKADOUS, Mouna + POUMAILLEUX, Alexis + SORTES, Thibault)
  • Investigating a number of Japanese knot techniques to tie bamboo with plastic ribbons (El SOKARY, Amin + MIYAJI, Karin)
  • Designing a prefabricated facade bamboo skeleton using the knots investigated and the plastic ribbons (FICINI, Elisa + JIAZHEN, Lin + KIERZKWOWSKA-KLYS, Maria + Le NAY, Erwan)
  • Designing a facade system that used the facade bamboo skeleton for growing air filtering plants (CANADAS MEGIA, Pilar + GUIRARD, Vincent + LEFEBVRE, Isabelle + ORTEGA, Carla)
  • Prototyping a mechanical water pump for hydroponic farming system used to water the air filtering plants (KENNEDY, Laura + STEPHENS, Amanda)
  • Designing a water filtering system for growing vegetables (BONGARD, Tomas + BUREL, Clara + MORBELLI, Delna), water that also ends-up in the fish tank (part of the hydroponic  and mechanical water pump system).

Thank you to OSSEO-ASARE, Dk, AMP co-founder, for being part of the mid-review. Thank you to CHICOTEAU, Félix and GIROUD, Thomas, former M&D students, for being part of the Final Jury.

Final perspective System 1 M&D 2015 PET Plastic machine

Engineering 4 Society

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Presented the paper entitled: Investigated 3E Materials at Agbogbloshie in Accra, Ghana at the Raising Awareness for the Societal and Environmental Role of Engineering and (Re)Training Engineers for Participatory Design (Engineering 4 Society) conference that was held in Leuven, Belgium, June 18-19, 2015.

The product life cycles of electrical appliances and electronic devices impact society and the environment, given the hazardous portion present in their materials flow. Scrapping as an industry serves to decommission end-of-life (EOL) equipment, linking materials processing and recovery activities with recycling, but must be controlled against adverse environmental and human health safety factors. This work tracks an on-going effort-the Agbogbloshie Makerspace Platform (AMP)-to use participatory design methods to upgrade capabilities of the scrap, recycling and maker community located at Agbogbloshie in Accra, Ghana through co-creation of technology. The authors explain AMP’s aim to reconceptualize Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE or e-waste) as Electrical and Electronic Equipment (EEE or 3E): not as waste, but as inter-manipulable assemblages of 3E-materials. AMP seeks to employ a hands-on Makers and Development approach (M&D) as a collaborative process to drive interclass innovation by co-designing and fabricating a makerspace, or open community workshop and lab, and networking e-waste and scrap recyclers starting at Agbogbloshie with students and recent graduates in Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts and Mathematics or STEAM fields. The investigation at Agbogbloshie over a period of 24 months suggests opportunities for utilizing participatory design to leverage waste management and 3E-materials processing across informal sector recycling ecosystems as inputs for popular prototyping, i.e. peer-to-peer digital fabrication and distributed manufacturing.

Capture d'écran 2015-11-28 13.50.27

M&D Spring 2015

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A glimpse of the work produced by M&D students in the Spring of 2015, before some get selected to join the (Bazaar Strategies + &) team in Ghana this July-August 2015 to work further on the Building Trust Project. Students investigated through scenario / comic book making how to build trust using a digital platform and created scenarios to be tested in the field. Below an excerpt of the work by Chebab Hussein, Komar Anna and Skibinski Dominik who inquired about how to earn “master maker” status:

 

Mastermaker Screenshot 2015

 

The Sounds of Agbogbloshie

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We have a huge blog posts backlog, but here is at least one regarding sound recording conducted in Agbogbloshie on the 22/7/2014 (a while back!), the day Ellen Foster, PhD candidate at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, NY visited AMP (Thank you for recording a major part of it). So much has been said about Agbogbloshie but not often the right story! Agbogbloshie is a busy recycling/making center and you can hear the rhythm of the hammers, dismantling or making…

‘Sounds of Agbogbloshie‘ playlist on Soundcloud: