ISEN-ASTC-L is a service of the Association of Science-Technology Centers
Incorporated, a worldwide network of science museums and related institutions.
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Hello John:

representing a profit-oriented firm that provides interactive exhibits
and exhibitions, I would like to thank you for your comment. It is,
unfortunately, correct that high-quality exhibits are very “expensive”.
High-quality standard commercially available parts from industry – such
as precision-ground guideways or even a simple Siemens S5 electronic
control system, for instance – have their price. But above all, skilled
and experienced labour is also very expensive, as the system "hire and
fire" does not work at all, in particular in our (European) social
market system. Time and again, we lose projects and orders in the tender
period because we exceed by far the fabrication budgets of our clients.
We cannot compensate for this financial squeeze by buying cheap
materials. We can only strive to work as efficiently as possible on the
basis of a fair and honest tender which wins us the contract … But in a
long run, we really think that it is worth it to invest more money on
the actual fabrication of exhibits at the very beginning.

However, there is no such thing as indestructible interactive
exhibitions or installations that will last for eternity. We, the
manufacturers, are always dependent on the care and maintenance of an
exhibition, something that can only be done by the client and the
operator of such projects. But if we get the chance to build high
quality exhibits and installations the probability of decreased
maintenance costs is very high.

Sincerely,
Axel

--
Kurt Hüttinger GmbH
Mittelbügweg 90 - Schwaig bei Nürnberg - Germany
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www.huettinger.de






John Bowditch schrieb:

>ISEN-ASTC-L is a service of the Association of Science-Technology Centers
>Incorporated, a worldwide network of science museums and related institutions.
>*****************************************************************************
>
>Hi,
>
>I guess I may as well wade in on this one and give my two cents' worth too. I think it's safe to say that none of us (including the Smithsonian) have enough personnel to maintain all the exhibits that seem to break at the most inopportune of times. (Why is it that they always seem to gang up on us and die at the same time which is also the most inconvenient?)
>
>Anyway, I think one of the most effective ways to get at this problem is spend more intelligent money up front to "build 'em right" in the first place. We have found that carefully designed exhibits, built with industrial quality parts, are likely to be very reliable. This can sometimes cost a lot of money up front in terms of design and testing time and in the purchase of sometimes very costly parts. For example, a brushless DC motor driven pressure blower made by Ametek might easily cost $ 500.00 dollars whereas a leaf-blower might be picked up at Home Depot for $ 50.00. BUT the former will long outlast any $ 50.00 blower and be quieter to boot. Cheap parts are great for prototypes but have no place in heavily used exhibits that are expected to last for a decade or more. The same goes for quickly arrived at design solutions.
>
>I could go on with other examples but won't. The point is that we all often "step over a dollar to pick up a dime" and this can be very costly later. I think more of us should be designing exhibits with the long-term costs in mind. Most exhibit houses don't take this approach and we all know what this causes. In addition, it's very important to design things so it is easy and simplistic to repair them when they do break, hopefully with the use of volunteers or at least people who don't have to have a degree in electrical, information, or mechanical engineering.
>
>A subset of this is the matter of lighting. There are fixtures available right now that use HID lamps that last between 12,000 and 24,000 hours and you don't have to trade off light control or color to gain the benefits. And these types are three to four times more energy efficient than even Quartz Halogen lamps. Sure, they are initially much more expensive but who wants to be changing bulbs every 6 months when they could last 3 years?
>
>John Bowditch
>Exhibits Director
>Ann Arbor Hands-On Museum
>
>
>

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