Geography technicians Rick Ketler and Katrin Tanner get set to launch 'Lego' flume

Flume lab Research Project Manager Rick Ketler and Engineering Technician Katrin Tanner are close to seeing two years of design and prototyping come together into the operational launch of the “Lego” flume. A novel project inside Dr. Marwan Hassan’s geomorphology and hydrology lab, the Lego flume is so nicknamed for its adjustable width, length, height and incline. This impressively flexible tool joins two existing flumes in the lab to round out their experimentation arsenal.

A flume is an artificial river of sorts, used to study the behaviour of sediments under different flow regimes. Sands and gravels of various shapes and sizes can be placed in this customizable water channel, photographed from above and image analyzed to reveal the behavioral characteristics of sediment under different flow conditions. The data generated from these experiments reveals important insights into hydrological behaviours of actual rivers and landscapes. For example, flume research can be used to understand how building a bridge across a stream can impact things like gravel deposition and in turn stream flow, salmon habitat, bank erosion and so on. This research is a powerful tool to better understand the natural world, and the effects of weather, climate change and human activity on the landscapes we inhabit.

Rick Ketler brings 35 years of expertise transforming scientific queries into functional tools to this complex project. Having worked at UBC in an engineering technician capacity since 1989, Rick considers himself a “jack of all trades”, with a broad knowledge base and a keen interest in problem solving and collaboration. With a background in physics, Rick started off working with Dr. Andy Black in what was then UBC’s Agricultural Sciences department (now Land and Food Systems), designing and building tower-based research sites for measuring greenhouse gases in remote forest locations. In 2007, he joined UBC Geography and has worked over the years with various physical geographers on a wide range of projects. Having collaborated with Dr. Hassan for over a decade, overseeing the design and construction of the Lego flume has been one of Rick’s most exciting achievements.

“Our skill as technicians is taking these conceptual geofluvial questions and translating them into something practical that can be measured. There’s an interface between what the science is asking and what you can create in a lab. That’s the fun and the challenge of this work,” Ketler says.

The second half of a nimble team of two, Katrin Tanner brings her expertise in engineering and programming to the project. Holding a Bachelor of Engineering in Mechatronics and a Master of Science in Systems Design, Katrin combines her mechanical, electrical and robotics engineering skills with her knowledge of programming language to tackle all aspects of the project from the design to build stage.

“I like the blend of work I do, balancing computer tasks with designing solutions and the physical work of building prototypes. It’s rewarding to see my ideas and designs come to life in the physical world, to see a project through from start to end and be part of the trouble shooting,” explains Katrin.

The past twelve months of designing and prototyping together have come along with a lot of challenges and opportunities for flexing those problem-solving muscles.

“The building process itself is usually comparably quick. It’s the design, part ordering, troubleshooting and rethinking things that takes longer than the actual construction. Big projects like this have multiple design stages. So you’re going through these stages again and again,” says Katrin

Leaks are the biggest challenge of any flume build and Rick and Katrin have had their fair share along the way.

“We had a moment when we first turned the water on and there were some catastrophic leaks. So that was pretty exciting!” shares Rick.

Leaks and floods weren’t the only challenges. Getting the parts into the building was difficult enough.

“When we had to tip the big water storage tank, that was really something. The tank was delivered to us standing vertically and it seemed it wasn’t going to fit through hallway and make it into the lab! It narrowly fit by about an inch. Then we had to tip it over to lay it on the ground and position it beneath the flume. It was so large and heavy, it took us a whole day to figure out how to do it,” remembers Katrin.

But it’s these hurdles that have kept Rick and Katrin so invested in the project and their work overall.

“There’s a lot of freedom in the workplace to find solutions to these exciting challenges. I really enjoy seeing other people’s approaches to solving problems, coming up with ideas you wouldn’t. That’s been the best part of working alongside Katrin and with these talented graduate students. You’re learning all the time” Rick reflects.

With the flume just weeks away from being fully operational, both Rick and Katrin are eager to see the fruits of their labour in action with incoming students to the lab and new research projects kicking off. Supporting new scientific goals with their engineering and fabrication expertise is rewarding for both of them. Katrin will be moving on from her role as Engineering Technician this fall to pursue exciting new opportunities with a company in her hometown of Nesselwang, Germany. Rick Ketler will be gracing the halls of Geography with his master troubleshooting skills for only a few months more before his retirement in December of this year. The Lego flume will stand as a testament to both their enormous talents and dedication to furthering scientific discoveries at UBC and beyond.