So for our engineering project, our team (Ventus Engineering) was required to construct a bridge to span 15" using a maximum of 100 drinking straws, and 20 feet of string with a goal of suspending 1 brick. After much reasearch it became clear that we could aim for a "truss" style with many small triangles:
- but we wanted to do better. SO after much brainstorming we came up with the basic ideas sketched at the top - a flat boxy grid with loops of string through the straws and hanging below as a harness for the weight (bricks). The idea developed further and further. The plan came to fruition after a good prototype and here is the first test of the final product:
We used some great strategies such as packing 6 slit straws inside of each Dairy Queen straw for strength and using a tight lashing with string to strengthen the joints in the middle of the bridge.
The day of competition came and our bridge had an unknown strength. We didn't want to load it to the point of failure in our testing sessions because we were afraid it would permanently weaken the bridge. So the moment of truth came - all teams passed the initial requirement of holding one brick, but then came the fun part: loading to the point of failure (see the previous team as they try to add another brick):
Our bridge came last - no other teams' bridge could support more than 6 bricks (and that was with "questionable" brick placement). We loaded our bridge. And kept loading. And kept loading :) We ran out of bricks after the 7th one and resorted to a can of Mt. Dew (in honour of Jason and the professor). It never did fail and our bridge has now been donated to the professor's collection.
I admit I was on a high for the rest of the day and today too for that matter. Jose (the guy behind the Mt. Dew) and I put a lot of time and effort into making it work and it performed beautifully. It is a great feeling to see an idea come through the way you hoped it would.
Now we just have to write a big paper about the process from beginning to end that is due tomorrow...
5 comments:
Awesome!!! Great Job!! I'm very proud of you guys!! It's crazy!! The mountain dew does give it an extra touch. You should give a picture of it to the Dairy Queen that you got the straws from--I think they'd get a kick out of it.
Love you bunches!! I'll talk to you later!!
That was awesome! Thanks for posting all the pics and drawing and everything. We really enjoyed reading all about it. We're very proud of you! (HA - sounds like I'm just echoing MIchelle's post, eh?) But what else can we say? Maybe: Love you! (Oh, she said that, too!) Well, what's a mom to do?
Mom and Dad
Ah yes, the wonderful straw bridge test. Cool design. Question: It looks like the first brick of those stacked above the bridge is keeping the arch from bending up. What would happen if, instead of standing the one brick on end, you stacked as many bricks as possible below the arch? I ask because it appears that you are using the load as a structural element.
You are indeed correct - the load is a critical part of the structure.
I suppose a way to bypass that requirement would be to simply link the two ends of the bridge directly with string so that the bridge was formed in a permanent arc (much like a hunting bow)...
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