One Star Turn

courtesy of Bouny Te

We ran into a surprisingly large problem before starting the downstream path excavation. A Cambodian One Star General had purchased the land downstream of the reservoir and did not want the stream to run through his land. It took quite a few discussions and some negotiating but we eventually agreed to turn back to the original stream path as quick as possible (see the relatively sharp turn to the left in the photo above). This path is more of a temporary solution until next dry season when we can provide a larger path and armor the side embankment at the turn. But this is a great example of one of the many completely unexpected problems that popped up during the project.

Excavating the downstream path

ceda watches as a local villager excavates the channel

Excavation for the downstream path have begun. This path will guide the water from the watergates back to the existing O'Tabet stream. Manual labor was the best alternative considering costs and safety. At this point, the ground is saturated due to the rainy season, and having any heavy equipment out on site can be unstable. Work is estimated to be complete by next week.

Dengue Fever

DENGUE FEVER

it's a serious disease, and nyc will be hit with a severe case of it this saturday, 7/5, at central park's summerstage! dengue fever was first introduced to this project via human translations' video, using "sleepwalking through the mekong" as the soundtrack to this powerful video clip. since then, ewb-nyc have been committed to this water dam project.

"...when things get hard within a project...you tend to search for reasons why you shouldn't finish it..." -Zac Holtzman to AM newyork.

Another Grassing Ceremony

monks from HRND walking across the west embankment

Another grassing ceremony was organized last week, attempting to make the final push to protect the embankment. To date, over 90% of the embankment is covered.

sforbes point of view

steve's photos roughly put together

Race To Finish

before: March 2007, view from breach, looking east into reservoir

after: view from the gate controls, looking east into the reservoir

A first glimpse of impounding water in the resevoir. It's now (has been) a race to pull everything together for completion before the rain really hits. There are still a few outstanding items, such as finalizing on the downstream path, grassing of the remaining embankment, and rip-rap lining critical areas to prevent erosion.

Complete With The Cherry Topping

more photos of the completed dam

The concrete work on the watergate have been completed last week, and now backfilling to both wingwalls are done! Topped off with a little color, the red beam is part of the control assembly to open and close the two gates. Hats off to all the field crew!

Hydro Revisited

l to r: jason chan, brent katlin, monica louie

During the past few meetings, we've been revisting the hydro study done last summer by Brent, Tim, and John. The original study was based on the watergate to provide a spillway capacity large enough to accomodate for a 100yr design storm event. This assumption, however, resulted in a rather costly labyrinth structure. Thus, we decided to modify upon an existing design, and propose to revisit the hydro analysis to consider some spillway capacity that may be provided at other locations, such as the several existing south canals.

Looking back, the hydro assessment have undergone a long journey, starting from getting information about the river intersection, assessing the condition of the south embankment and the entryway of the south canals, and walking down one of the canals, called the Krapeu Canal.

The KAP Doctors

l to r: larry on cadd, comparison of new and old kap jig, dustyn on band saw

Several weeks ago, i was introduced to Larry and Dustyn. They are both mechanical engineers, and generally work on robotic engineering. They heard about the KAP unit we've used on the project, and also heard that it malfunctioned soon after it's initial flight. So they volunteered to fix it! They've proposed to rebuild the jig, and hook up new servos to the unit. From Cadd to fabrication, these guys had all the right tools to do the job. Seeing them work was amazing and fun, these guys are true geekLabers!

The Concrete is Complete!

Here is a shot of Chanda, Mean Someth, and Chai (l to r) standing on the completed watergate structure. The earthwork around the structure is underway now and the embankment grassing is about 50 to 60% complete. But another big milestone has been met and almost two months ahead of schedule!

Grassing the Embankment

Monsoon Grassing from Human Translation on Vimeo.

Grassing Ceremony

Mean Somethe of HRND discusses plans for embankment grassing

HT and HRND have been coordinating with the local villagers on grassing of the embankment. The planning took several weeks, and kicked off this past Sunday with a great success. Nearly 50% of the main embankment was covered in one day! The effort was distributed amongst the villagers by allotting sections of the embankments to a particular village. This made coordination and managing efforts much more efficient.
During the coordination and planning efforts of this task, things seem to fall in place as far as establishing a Water User Group. Leaders and villagers have come forth and organized into work groups. Continual participation from the villagers and leaders such as this will lead to their better understanding, ownership, and maintenance of the structure once it's handed over to them.

Design Squad

Last November wiL brought a very fancy HD video camera to Cambodia which was given to him by a film crew working for a PBS show called Design Squad. Each episode has a short segment about engineers or designers that are working on interesting projects and the crew wanted to produce a short segment about Matt Sisul and Wil Cao for their show. So we took a bunch of videos of the project and of us messing around and the crew was able to turn it into a really great clip. And it was recently shown on TV! Here is a link to the video.

B Roll from Human Translation

HV20 Test: Children on Embankment from Tobias on Vimeo.

Quick Update

Here is a new photo from Bouny, Steve Forbes is back in Siem Reap, and it sounds like Chanda will be close to completing concrete by the end of this month!

Steel Gateway

Chanda has been sending us drawings on the steel gateway. There have been several discussions on paint products to prevent the weathering and rust of the steel, and most of the conversation has led to a non-organic zinc epoxy base type of paint system.

similar to the TaBin gateway

Khmer New Year

celebration of the khmer new year in long beach, ca

As the Khmer New Year celebrations reaches its end, the construction crew returns to the site to continue with the concrete work. From the latest progress reports, both wingwalls are complete, and formwork is being prepared on the dissipation blocks. At the same time, Chanda has been preparing for the fabrication of the steel gateway.

One Down ...

Chanda and the crew completed the first wing wall pour last week ...


and they have moved right onto forming the next one.


The structure is starting to take shape!

Steve Forbes - Man of the Year

Steve Forbes is like a superstar. With a name like that floating around at an EWB conference, you're guaranteed to attract a group of students and professionals wanting to have a chat with you, asking for advice, opinion, and even time to sit in on one of their meetings.

It thus comes to no surprise that he was honored this year's "FOUNDERS AWARD" for "...embracing the visibility and advancing the mission of EWB-USA..."

The unsuspecting Steve Forbes humbly accepted his award to a standing ovation of 700 people.

Congrats Steve!

EWB National Conference Seattle

l to r: Steve Forbes, Sammy, Bryse, wiL

Bryse and I attended the EWB National Conference held in Seattle on behalf of our NYC chapter to present the water dam project. We meet up with Steve Forbes and Sammy, a student from Ghana, here to represent one of the international chapters (EWB-Ghana) and participate on the International EWB Panel Discussions

Progress Update

The foundation is complete, the sidewalls are being formed and should be poured in the next few days. Things are moving right along!

The Foundation Slab is DONE!

Chanda and his crew finished the foundation slab! The volume of concrete already poured is about 50% of the total water gate concrete volume and they finished a month ahead of schedule!

EWB...Beyond Borders

photos by rotciv97

Matt Barber, from the Usalama Project, and I presented to the Municipal Engineers of New York (MENY) on Wednesday evening. Our topic was "Engineers Without Borders 'Keeping it Simple' – Using Engineering Fundamentals to Build Big in the Developing World". The presentation went quite well, and many expressed interests not only in the projects, but in EWB-NY as a chapter.

Mixing Concrete

Since our test cylinders arrived yesterday, we have spent some time on site working to cast samples of Chanda's concrete recipe. One of the challenges we faced was taking the recipe - written in kilograms of cement, gravel, sand, and water per cubic meter of concrete, and pretty much useless without a very expensive scale that can measure up to a metric ton - and converting it to units that would be more user-friendly for the workers who will be mixing the endless batches of concrete for our project. In this case, we used the measured density of all four ingredients to convert kilograms (mass) to buckets (volume) and marked out one of the buckets for measuring each material. After a short explanation of our "measuring bucket", the laborers were able to quickly assemble a batch of concrete at exactly the correct proportions.
Currently, workers are busy finishing excavations and bending rebar, and in the next few days they will start installing forms and bars, with the goal of pouring the first of the foundations by the end of the week. Stay tuned...

Mudmat!

Hey Everybody, it's Jess here. I'm keeping up to date with Matt's progress photos (I used one of your pics in my post, Matt!), I have to say it's so great to see the site developing the way it is. After all the hard work, frustrations, and tough decisions that were made, especially in January, seeing the project take shape is very satisfying. Matt, I have to be honest, I envy you right now! I definitely wish I was there to see things happening in person.

I showed a few of my coworkers at Skanska the construction progress photos the other day. All were very impressed at the work that is being done, and those that were familiar with the project history (specifically, Shelly) were especially complimentary that our entire team was able to overcome the roadblocks we were faced with and make it into the construction stage. So, I will pass those compliments along to everybody that has been involved in this project.

It was great to be able to share the story of the project through the pictures, and this just opened up great discussions about the EWB organization in general. People were interested in what we do, and how to get involved. I think that there are huge resources of people in our NY area that could be of great assistance in this project, and future projects - both young engineers, and older more experienced engineers. Many just haven't heard of EWB, or don't know how to get involved - now that I have had my own personal experience being involved, and having visited the site, I want to use this to educate people and get them excited and involved.

I'll keep everybody posted on how these efforts go... Until then, keep the progress photos coming! Good luck over there, keep safe & productive!

Jess

Bussmann is back in 'bodia

Matt Bussmann just arrived back in Cambodia almost a full year after the last site assessment. We are pretty lucky that he did. Chanda is gearing up for pouring concrete and Matt has quite a bit of concrete inspection experience.

a concrete chute

surveying for the top of base slab elevation

Road Trip to PP

Before signing the contract with Chanda for the concrete water gate we had to meet quite a few times. However, Chanda lives in Phnom Penh and our project is just outside of Siem Reap. Chanda came to visit us in SR a few times so we decided it would be a good idea for us to go to PP and meet with him. We also decided it would be a good idea to load up the truck and drive our selves. The two cities are connected by Highway 6 which is one of the better roads in Cambodia but is basically a two lane deathtrap used by cars, pedestrians, motos, students on bicycles, dogs, cows, water buffalo, chickens, etc. If you take a bus between the cities it takes 6 hours, by taxi it's only 4. We figured we would be able to make great time, however, after 5 and a 1/2 hours of white knuckles on the steering wheel we finally arrived in PP exhausted and went straight to our meeting with Chanda.

On the way back we were better prepared. We didn't have a meeting waiting for us so we took our time, brought a bunch of snacks and had a really fun road trip.

Weekly Site Meetings

Every Thursday we meet on site to review open issues. A typical meeting discussion includes things like construction productivity, budget and spending, community issues, and future work planning. Here are some regular attendees:

Chai (Project Assistant) and Ceda (Community Development Assistant)

Narith (Construction Manager)

Bouny (Project Coordinator)

one of Bac Krons dogs (potentially lunch)

Kong Chanda

Our original plan for the implementation of this project was to start the embankment work then begin the concrete water gate and have two separate crews working simultaneously. However, when we began gearing up for the concrete work it became increasingly apparent that our crew did not have the so-mat-a-pe-up (capacity) to handle it. An example of this being the rebar cutter shown above. When purchased, the crew incorrectly believed it could cut up to a size D24 rebar. So we tapped into the ex-pat network and found three concrete contractors in Siem Reap to provide bids. But they were all high and not having any personal experience with any of them we were a bit hesitant to start anything with someone new. So in December we called Kong Chanda.


Chanda worked for HT about a year and a half ago and worked with our first site assessment team. wiL, Ryan and Alexi had nothing but great things to say about him and we were very concerned when he left the project for work in Phonon Penh. When we originally contacted him in December it was just for his opinion on our situation; high bids from unknown contractors. But after that first phone conversation Chanda called back 5 minutes later to tell us he would be in Siem Reap the next day to meet with us and see the site. As a side note: when Chanda saw the rebar cutter he correctly told us it could not cut anything bigger than a D16 rebar.


After that site visit in December we decided that hiring Chanda and his company to build the concrete water gate would be our best chance of finishing. Almost all business contacts we had made so far simply looked at us foreigners as a dollar sign despite the explanation of our project objective. Chanda was the first person to have a genuine interest in the project and helping the people of Balang. So we began trying to create this new project team. Chanda, very patiently, provided many different bids, schedules and met with us several times in Siem Reap and Phnom Penh over the next two months. Finally, after lots of very hard work by Chanda, HT and EWB-NY, we were able to agree on a contract price, sign the contract and Chanda has begun working. Chanda’s contract scope includes the complete concrete water gate and soil backfill around the structure. Essentially, everything left to make this reservoir functional.

The Earth Work Is Complete!

The earth work is complete! We finished the all of the major earth moving necessary for the embankment repair and the equipment has been removed from the site. Above is the main embankment ...


the North embankment ...


and the South embankment.
We still have a lot of work, most critical right now is grassing the entire embankment before the rainy season begins. We will also need to install a rip rap band at the future water level, install monitoring wells and potentially a toe drain on the down stream side. But this is a major milestone completed a month before originally scheduled!

superbowl decision

Superbowl Sunday, and as most Americans started their day today with anxious excitement to watch the game, the EWB Cambodia team started with a conference call to discuss final decisions on selecting which design to move forward with; the labyrinth design, or the straight weir design previously submitted to TAC. We have spent the last few weeks optimizing the labyrinth design to bring the cost down to fit the budget, but as time became a critical factor, the group was under pressure to finalize on one design to focus on.
Both designs have their pros and cons, and the group discussed at great length all of their concerns for each design. We concluded by agreeing to each write an individual final statement to submit to Steve Forbes, as he had previously agreed to be moderator should a decision not be reached within the group.

Trip to Cambodia (a short version)

Hey bloggers! It's Jess, and I am on day...9 of my trip out to Siem Reap. I don't have too much time to write now, and I only wanted to get my first post up on the blog before I ran out of time here. But I would like to say that this trip has been incredible so far. Everything I can think of to write at this moment is falling short of accurately describing the experience, which I imagine that the rest of you guys who have been out here on a site visit can attest to also. Everyone is really puttnig a big effort in right now, trying to close the gap between our budget and our costs.

I have taken a lotttt of pictures that i will post on the website as soon as I get them downloaded (or uploaded, i guess).

More from me in the near future....

Jess

The Helicopter Ride

Before leaving Siem Reap Steve Forbes insisted on taking a helicopter ride to the site to get some aerial photography. The helicopter was just brought to town by a company that uses it to fly tourists around Angkor Wat but our pilot, Matt, was happy to take a detour from his normal loop and help us find Trau Kod.


It took us less than 10 minutes to fly to the site and Steve, Bouny and I didn't stop taking photos until we landed. It was really amazing. This was the first time we could see the entire project at once; other than the blurry satellite photos we have been using from google earth.


When we got back I sent a text to Chai asking him if he saw us flying above. He wrote back: "I only saw steve clearly.did u land off? A lots of people ask me did u operate or pilot instruct u some and Y not land off at site? Oh,i think u had big..fun.!"

Mr. Trau Kod

Recently, our friend Boc Kron built Mr. Trau Kod (shown above) to protect the reservoir and embankment. It was explained to me that Cambodian people believe there are spirits for all elements such as earth, wind, clouds, etc. and Mr. Trau Kod was built to represent the spirit of the reservoir. This spirit is meant to protect the area and seek revenge on anyone that would harm the reservoir. I think we will still need to implement our inspection and maintenance program after the project is completed but it's comforting to know we have Mr. Trau Kod on our side.