Bridge Project

Our latest project assigned to us was the bridge. As a group we have to come up with an idea for a struturally sound brige that can hold a total of 20 kg. We are allowed to only use dowel rods and wood glue, and our maximum amount that can be spent is $8. We built a bridge from an idea that was brought about using the West Point Bridge Designer program that our team downloaded. We all came up with basically the same idea for the bridge's structure, and decided to use Pratt Trough Truss idea to construct our bridge. Putting the bridge together did not take that long, but the process in which we had to take to be able to put our bridge together was a little bit time consuming. It takes approximately 24 hours for the wood glue to be completely dry, so that put a damper in being able to build the entire bridge in one day. We ended up building the sides of the bridges, letting them dry, then attaching them on the top and the bottom. Part of the rules for this project was that we had to have a cardboard "road" and a u-bolt attached in the middle of the bridge that we can hang weight off of. So we made our road have a small hill in the middle of it so the u-bolt could be attached properly. The bridge came out very nicely and we are planning on it being able to hold the amount of weight it is supposed to.

Tennis Ball Launcher

As a group we were assigned a project to come up with a device that can launch a tennis ball. We had the stipulations of only being able to spend $8, and the dimensions were 18x18x20. We had a two week assigned period to work on this project and make an adequate tennis ball launcher. We had to make a launcher that could shoot a tennis ball a 25 feet distance, and hit a target that was 2 feet above the ground. It took us many attempts to find the right way to build this machine, and trial and error was our main way of testing. Throughout the process of building this we learned how to work better as a team and what each person could bring to the project. We finished the project and ended up only hitting the target two times out of six, but the project in itself was a learning experience that was quite enjoyable.