All,

Last week I had an epiphany that we should probably have a sign on the door that lists our hours, even if they are appointment only. That’s in the works, should be ready tomorrow.

With the decrease in testing for grad/staff we’ve had to turn a few people away for not being up-to-date. They have, by and large, been totally understanding. A few people have emailed and canceled ahead of time, which is welcomed.

Set up a secondary pegboard in the shop to better organize freewheel/cassette tools—it’s a vast improvement over the drawer and/or coffee can we’d been using before. Last week I grabbed the scrap metal bin, some miscellaneous parts, and Aquaham Lincoln. He’ll live atop the fridge.

This week I’ll coordinate with Parking to pick up a few bikes—only space for 3 or so—for instructional/teaching purposes with the new hires, schedule a staff meeting for my team, finalize placement for wheel hooks around the shop to increase storage.

The numbers:

Visitors: 12
Sales: $747
Memberships: 4 for $120
Refurb bike: 2 for $430
Tire/tubes: 10 for $57

Thanks!

Jacob Benjamin
Campus Bike Center Manager

Morgan White, Associate Director of F&S for Sustainability, responded to Dr. Ximing Cai with the following email. See the attached file for an overview of the building envelope testing pilot project.

===

Hi Ximing,

Thank you for sharing the Energy002 SWATeam recommendation. As we discussed, F&S is pleased to move forward with this recommendation to do a Building Envelopes Pilot Project on campus.  We have submitted a request to the Student Sustainability Committee, seeking their support to run this pilot project.  We are also meeting with Bill Rose, the co-chair of the iCAP Energy Team, and several F&S team members to discuss first steps.  I’ve attached a project overview here, which we can share with the iCAP Working Group.

Thanks,

Morgan

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See transmittal of Energy002 Building Envelope to F&S here. 
See iWG assessment of Energy002 Building Envelope here.
See recommendation and submittal of Energy002 Building Envelope here. 

For additional progress on this effort, see Building Envelope Pilot Project. 

All,

Another week in the books! It’s definitely still an adjustment to be open only by-appointment. We’re still getting phone calls and emails about user error and whatnot when scheduling and we’re only seeing 4 or so people per day. But hey, it’s a pandemic. People are still going to the old shop—some internet search engines are not up-to-date but we do have signage over there. Ironies of all ironies since people couldn’t seem to find that tucked-away garage before and are now flocking to it, it seems.

Had a refurb-swap of a loose cranked bike. Thankfully the gentleman wasn’t injured in the failure. He took a different same-priced bike. He was very understanding and that was appreciated.

Still working on upping our staffing levels to a comfortable number.

We’ve only done a handful of bike registrations, which either speaks to the cost-as-deterrence or that people are picking them up elsewhere. Hopefully the latter!

Still optimizing the layout and functionality of our new space but everyone who’s visited that was familiar with the old space has been blown away by the across-the-board improvements. I discovered a closet here that I didn’t know existed which now is storing the Bikes at Work trailer and the smaller kid-sized one. Aquaham Lincoln will likely migrate over here this week.

The numbers:

Visitors: 21
Sales: $562.70
Memberships: 3 for $90
Bikes: 3 for $360
Tires/tubes: 1 for $1

Thanks!

Jacob Benjamin
Campus Bike Center Manager

The Solar Farm 2.0 construction is on schedule to be in service by 1/28/2021. Currently the project is installing approximately 4,400 posts in ground for the panel foundations. One of key objectives is to complete the Golden Row* by end of this month. Once the golden row is completed, inspected, and approved, the construction will be in full force to reach completion. The university is scheduled to perform routine inspections and capture all the underground equipment GPS points for reference. A recycling plan is in place, and the project is coordinating with F&S Transportation to collect the recyclable waste. The installation of a utility switch on the east side of the farm is complete.

Procurement: We have received all the racking equipment and about 80% of the solar panel on site. Transformers and inverters are scheduled to be delivered by end of Oct 2020.

~by Sushanth Girini, management engineer at F&S Utilities and Energy Services

* Golden Row - is a single row of solar panel constructed by the construction crew. Once the project make sure all the connections are good and row is as per design, it gets approved. It's like a start of what's coming. Like a movie trailer!