Michael McNaught - Hexacart

The Client.

We tested the Library's existing book cart to determine our design objectives.

Based on our trial run of the display set-up, we determined that the existing book cart:

1.) Could not protect its materials from the elements as it travelled outside.

2.) Could not properly display its materials.

3.) Could not function as its own library.

These were our most important problems to solve for this project. These issues needed to be addressed with a design that was as engaging as the 'Tiger Book Mobile' without being as costly.

RIT Libraries' existing cart did not have enough display space. Students were forced to rely on their environment to show library materials.

Trade Show + Library + Mobile

We decided to reframe our project as a trade show exhibit rather than standard furniture.

A better analogy for this project than a book mobile would be a trade show display. The goal of a trade show display is to entice interest from passerby's in a product/service through an interactive display users can engage with. This became the framework of our problem statement.

My First Sketch of what would become the final design.

foam core model.

Close-up of the first foam core model in use. Here we show the shelves taken off the cart and propped as part of the display.

Here we see the design's original intent in context. For scale, the foam-cut librarian is 6'.

initial prototype.

i created a working, full-scale prototype of the design in cardboard to find any potential issues before jumping to the final product.

Our cardboard model was completed in the Spring Semester of 2020.

It was at this stage we developed the fold-out desk behind the Hexacart. As pictured above, this creates a clear space for the librarian to sit and work.

woodworking and assembly.

This stage took a lot of development for the joinery. our process for assembling the main frame of the cart is documented below.

A few weeks after we finished our cardboard model in Spring 2020 and were ready to move onto woodworking, the Covid-19 pandemic hit and we were sent home to finish the semester remotely. Due to less access to the woodshop in the Fall of 2020, the project was halted for almost a year. It wasn't until Spring 2021 that we started assembling our final design as an independent study.