Architecture & Engineering Laboratories

The Architecture Studios of Metropolitan College support the teaching of architectural design, wood–metal–plastic processing, scale modelling, digital design, as well as architectural photography.

The lab contains equipment for the measurement and analysis of materials that are susceptible to various types of stresses (torsion/bending, tensile, deflection). These materials include metals (e.g., bronze, iron), geotechnical (e.g., soil, gravel, soil-fluid interaction), fluids (e.g., nozzle/orifice experiments, Bernoulli (Venturi) experiments, long-distance open channel flow in fluid dynamics), as well as microstructures (e.g., crystal structures, size distribution analysis).
The laboratory supports the measurements and experimentation of specimens, ranging from small to medium scale. Additionally, it houses (not exclusively) geodesy equipment along with the necessary accessories for field measurements.

The lab comprises the necessary equipment for electrical measurements, including but not limited to: multimeters, oscilloscopes, signal generator, DC variable power supply, AC converter / inverter and electric machines with their drives, DC machines and Drives, PV energy and drivers, Spectrum Analyser, as well as specialized software and high performance PCs.

The lab houses an industrial robotic arm (5 axis, 1.5m reach, 20kg load capacity) and a collaborative robot (cobot) (6 axis, 1m reach, 5kg load) for experimentation in robot mechanics and programming, as well as mechanical systems and necessary embedded systems for the experimentation on mobile robots (nVidia jetson / orin), along with specialized robotics operation software (e.g., ROS, RoboDK, KUKA eki) and high performance PCs.

The lab includes a CNC router machine capable of shaping soft material and aluminum blocks, 3D cartesian printers, 3D soft printer, laser cutter router, and the necessary manual manufacturing tools for correcting produced artefacts. The lab is equipped with the necessary PCs and related software for the calibration, programming, and communication to the aforementioned digital manufacturing machines. Additionally, the lab houses necessary equipment for developing PCB circuit designs and two-sided boards.

The lab is equipped with all the necessary machinery for manual processes, including milling machines, lathes, electric welding/oxy-fuel welding equipment, and moulding/casting facilities for prototypes. It also includes hand tools for the machining and processing of component parts (metallic, plastic, and other materials) manufactured through the relevant processes and/or alloys.

The lab comprises the necessary equipment for the measurement and simulation of dynamic systems, including not limited to: process control apparatus for fluid flow and reservoir control (pressure, temperature, tank capacity), desktop heat-transfer apparatus for assessing heat transfer rates through forced convection in an air flow, and a desktop wind tunnel apparatus for experimentation and measurement of wind flow turbulence (intensity, velocity, lift/drag) using different model shapes, alongside specialized software and high- performance PCs.