Technology
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The
story of the Homeprint "yellowXpress"
Case
study of technological practice
This
material has been produced by the Royal
Society of New Zealand (RSNZ) under contract to the Ministry of
Education. It has been written to assist teachers and schools in their
delivery of the technology and hangarau curriculum statements. The
project is jointly coordinated by personnel from the Technology
Education New Zealand (TENZ) and National Association of Māori
Mathematicians, Scientists and Technologists (NAMMSAT) networks. Monitoring
and evaluation of the material is carried out by a national project
advisory group.
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 Introduction
Carl Sheridan left New Plymouth Boys' High School in 1995. His seventh
form course of maths with calculus, maths with statistics, physics,
geography, and graphics and design was chosen, " ... to prepare me
for a university career in some form of engineering".
He was accepted by both the School of Architecture in Wellington
and the School of Engineering at Canterbury University however ended
up preferring to do a B.Tech. at Massey University in Palmerston
North ...
... because it wasn't all pure science and maths ... and
I thought the scope for employment would be better with a multi-disciplinary
degree ... When I finished my B.Tech. I decided to go on
and complete a Masters degree so that I would have a specialist
field to continue into …
Carl Sheridan
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As part of his third year B.Tech. course at Massey, Carl had to
do a major practical product development project. It was here that
he made contact with John Brebner at Homeprint in Feilding. At Homeprint
John runs a working letterpress printing museum – it is also
an art gallery, an art/craft teaching facility and a Book Art specialist
teaching facility. As an aside, John is also a developer of art/craft/technology
equipment designed to help teachers, students, and artists to produce
book art works.
... John is a unique person. In his business people come
first ... and the business comes later.
Carl Sheridan
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Two of John's sons had graduated from Massey in technology so he
was aware of the opportunity which is open to businesses like his
to work on an extended project with a B.Tech. student ... and of the
potential for a successful business outcome from the project for a
relatively small financial outlay. John had a number of projects which
he thought would be suitable and Carl joined one of John's print-making
classes to "get a feel for the business" and explore the range of
opportunities.
In his classes John's students use a small A4 press which he has developed
himself from a traditional printing design. The project that took
Carl's interest was the development and prototyping of a larger A3
art press.
©2000
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