The shoe project

Instead of the bridge project I decided to work with the shoe. I thought that it was going to be much easier for me to do. Through the first couple of days I was stumped by what materials to use because I wanted the sole of the shoe to be cushioned and flexible, like regular shoes. I didn’t have a clue on what to do about the sides of the shoe so I just thought that I would figure it out along the way. Well Mr. Kaluta brought in these tires that were part of the 6,000,000 that busted last year on the rods. I had an idea for the tires to be part of my sole of the shoe.

To create the shoe I had to copy my foot onto Auto-CAD. I think that Auto-CAD is always hard because of the zooming, symbols, etc. It was difficult and frustrating and I was about to quit. That took me about a week to get done and finally print out. So once I printed that out I cut the shape of my foot so I could trace it with a marker onto the side wall of the tire. I took a power tool that would cut through the tire and steel to get the shape out. This took me a long time because the blades kept breaking and they got dull fast. While I was helping a friend with her sole I was thinking of what else to do so it could stay in contact with my foot. When I was putting away my clothes I picked up a hanger and I was thinking I this would be good enough to support me for the time being. I grabbed a couple of hangers and took them to school. So I drilled holes in my shoe with a drill so that I could fit the end of the hanger into it and it would stay. After that I took a wrench and cut the hanger at a certain point, so it could curve over my foot when it’s on the sole. Cutting the steel hanger was hard for me to push down. My hands weren’t strong enough so I asked a helpful friend to do it for me and Mr. Kaluta at some points. I knew that this would hurt the sides of my foot so I just thought that wrapping some fabric would work. But I didn’t because I ran out of time. Whenever I walked it would slip off, I couldn’t really walk because it wouldn’t life up with my foot. So I cut out pockets of a purse and put them where would be sitting to help me lift it up, also for some kind of look. The situation was better but it still didn’t work for my left foot. With one day to think I decided to do something boring and add rubber bands to help lift the sole. As a result it felt like I was cutting the blood circulation to my foot. So that was pretty painful, but it was for an A I didn’t care. I completed the walking distance that took me about 20 minutes.

The only reason that I chose the shoe instead of the bridge was because when your making a shoe you can be very creative. You have to expand your mind to get the best results. Though that I can’t say that for me. Anyway you use your mind, but when it comes to the bridge you are instructed to what your supposed to do in order to succeed. So there’s no unique style to making such a structure. That’s just my opinion. So can see the Auto-CAD drawing at

www.mbhs.edu/~jkaluta/spring2002/791812.CC.shoe.dwg

You can also see the actual picture at