Project 1: Research Paper
In this assignment, you are to form groups of 4 members and write a research paper of your chosen theme with a 2500-3000 words (no more than 10 pages). Each group is to analyze and extract the important ideas from one of the theme highlighted below. The first part of the essay will be a review of the related text for the chosen theme. Using these ideas as the theoretical framework of each particular theme, students are to analyze a particular architecture(s) or urban design(s), highlighting the relationship between the theoretical ideas and the selected works. That should form the main
part of the essay, which is the analysis of completed works.
Ventilation System and Comfort Level of a Traditional Shophouse in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
The aim of this research is to study the ventilation systems of a traditional shophouse in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia and its comfort level. The selected shophouse chosen for our case study is Syarikat Wah Sang Brothers, located at Klang, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia and was built in 1900. The study first uses Autodesk Flow Design 2018 software to simulate the wind flow around and into the shophouse, showing the wind velocity and surface pressure around the selected case study, supported by indoor numerical data obtained using hygrometer. Here we can conclude the presence of ventilation system enable the indoor environment to be more comfortable than of the outdoor as there is a drop in temperature due to cross and stack ventilation in Syarikat Wah Sang Brothers.
However, the level of comfort at three different period: 1930, 1980 and the present days, when compared using the indoor air temperature and relative humidity data, are found to be decreasing, according to the psychrometric chart produced from Climatic Consultant, due to the increase in outdoor temperature. Therefore the study concludes that, although natural ventilation are capable of providing a cooler indoor environment compared to outdoor, it is no longer sufficient to cope with the current climatic conditions of increasing global temperature, and fails to achieve comfort level at present days. Therefore, mixed-mode ventilation system as a hybrid approach are suggested as conclusion, which integrates the use of air-conditioning when and where it is necessary, with the use of natural ventilation whenever it is feasible or desirable, to maximize comfort while avoiding the significant energy use and operating costs of year-round air conditioning.
