"Now why does everyone hate being wrong? you certainly learn more than if you were right." -Me, 2014
This blog is for updates on my projects related to STEM. To see the blog relating to random incidents in my life, click on this button:
September 17, 2013: Too Far behind (Rube Goldberg Machine)
It's been a long time since I made a change to the STEM website.
But then again, it has been a long time since I checked my email.
I think it was before I went to Iceland. Which was almost 2 months ago. So it has been a while. I should really check my email.
But we are not talking about email. We are talking about that Rube Goldberg Machine I was making with some other people. And we are actually a bit behind.
Don't worry. This time I took lots of pictures.
So where were we last time? Oh yes. The PVC pipe. A while ago we took some zip tabs and made a hole large enough for the PVC pipe to fit in, and we made a corkscrew out of that. Then it was on to what was formerly the flag tipping over. We decided not to do that, but instead have a weight inside the end of the PVC pipe that was connected to a pulley by a string. When a marble reached the end of the PVC pipe and hit the weight, the weight would fall down and, since connected to the string and pulley, would lift up a cup connected to the other side of the pulley, and when it hit the top a marble would fall out, and then continue the machine.
So we found a weight, got a pulley going and also found a paper cup and made two holes on the bottom where we would insert the string into. Unfortunately, the reason we are now so far behind is because we never actually got the thing to work. Most of the time the marble's force wouldn't be enough to knock the weight out of the pipe, even when placed on the very edge! When it did, and the pulley actually worked, the cup usually did let the marble just fall out, but usually sent it flying towards the other side of the room. Maybe the weight was too heavy, I don't know. We have to decide if we are still going to try and have this in our machine, or if we are going to try something different.
But then again, it has been a long time since I checked my email.
I think it was before I went to Iceland. Which was almost 2 months ago. So it has been a while. I should really check my email.
But we are not talking about email. We are talking about that Rube Goldberg Machine I was making with some other people. And we are actually a bit behind.
Don't worry. This time I took lots of pictures.
So where were we last time? Oh yes. The PVC pipe. A while ago we took some zip tabs and made a hole large enough for the PVC pipe to fit in, and we made a corkscrew out of that. Then it was on to what was formerly the flag tipping over. We decided not to do that, but instead have a weight inside the end of the PVC pipe that was connected to a pulley by a string. When a marble reached the end of the PVC pipe and hit the weight, the weight would fall down and, since connected to the string and pulley, would lift up a cup connected to the other side of the pulley, and when it hit the top a marble would fall out, and then continue the machine.
So we found a weight, got a pulley going and also found a paper cup and made two holes on the bottom where we would insert the string into. Unfortunately, the reason we are now so far behind is because we never actually got the thing to work. Most of the time the marble's force wouldn't be enough to knock the weight out of the pipe, even when placed on the very edge! When it did, and the pulley actually worked, the cup usually did let the marble just fall out, but usually sent it flying towards the other side of the room. Maybe the weight was too heavy, I don't know. We have to decide if we are still going to try and have this in our machine, or if we are going to try something different.
September 9, 2013: Walls. They are important i think (Rube Goldberg Machine)
I just realized that Weebly doesn't know what "Goldberg" is. Considering a famous cartoonist, a famous series of machines, and a famous TV show is named after that, that seems suspicious.
And also, Weebly keeps putting red marks under the word "Weebly". WTF.
Well, I had better start talking about our Rube Goldberg machine. Since Monday when we were given the base for our machine, we've been making progress. We took our board and cut off some of it. Then we made it stand up vertically and we nailed the part we cut off to the side so it sticks out. This way, we have more room for our project if we think of something, we will be able to make our machine "3D" instead of "linear", and also we could just add the most random stuff we want. You know...if we end up doing that.
Then we got to work on the beginning. Our design stated that we would have an inclined plane and have a marble roll down it, but it would be stopped by a wall that could be pulled up with a pulley. We finished that as well.
It was a little bit hard to nail the inclined plane to our board. I mean, it looks ugly if you see a billion nails in the front, so we had to nail from the back, and it's hard to coordinate that way. Eventually we got it working, but it was a little tricky. Apparently we didn't angle the slope as steep as we wanted to, but it still worked, so WHATEVER. We also had some trouble with the design of our board and a couple of people wanted something different. But all-in-all it worked okay.
We then went to the part where the marble rolls down sort of a "corkscrew" from a PVC pipe. We did some tests to see if it would work, and when we decided how we wanted it positioned, we took some pictures to remember how we aligned it because class was about to end.
So it went okay. We already have a good start. I have nothing else to say. Bye.Penguins
And also, Weebly keeps putting red marks under the word "Weebly". WTF.
Well, I had better start talking about our Rube Goldberg machine. Since Monday when we were given the base for our machine, we've been making progress. We took our board and cut off some of it. Then we made it stand up vertically and we nailed the part we cut off to the side so it sticks out. This way, we have more room for our project if we think of something, we will be able to make our machine "3D" instead of "linear", and also we could just add the most random stuff we want. You know...if we end up doing that.
Then we got to work on the beginning. Our design stated that we would have an inclined plane and have a marble roll down it, but it would be stopped by a wall that could be pulled up with a pulley. We finished that as well.
It was a little bit hard to nail the inclined plane to our board. I mean, it looks ugly if you see a billion nails in the front, so we had to nail from the back, and it's hard to coordinate that way. Eventually we got it working, but it was a little tricky. Apparently we didn't angle the slope as steep as we wanted to, but it still worked, so WHATEVER. We also had some trouble with the design of our board and a couple of people wanted something different. But all-in-all it worked okay.
We then went to the part where the marble rolls down sort of a "corkscrew" from a PVC pipe. We did some tests to see if it would work, and when we decided how we wanted it positioned, we took some pictures to remember how we aligned it because class was about to end.
So it went okay. We already have a good start. I have nothing else to say. Bye.Penguins
September 6, 2014: Excessive amounts of kool-aid (Rube goldberg machine)
So we got our Rube Goldberg machines started on. We were wondering what exactly we should do, and we spent like 30 minutes coming up with ideas until Eli suggested the objective that we eventually chose. The idea was to make a machine that pours Kool-Aid mix into a glass of water.Somewhere at the end of our machine, a pair of scissors would cut the string holding up the Kool-Aid so the package would fall into the water. We then changed it so the Kool-Aid would be held up by 2 strings so when 1 was cut, the package wouldn't fall into the water, but rather dump the contents into it (because seriously, do you want your Kool-Aid package to fall into your glass of water, causing you to have to fish it out? No.
Unfortunately we ditched the scissors idea. We had no idea how we would keep the scissors in place and how to make the scissors cut the string on its own. It would be too hard to have something accurately hit the scissors without either missing or sending them flying.
But for some time we decided on our basic design. We still don't really know how to hold all of this up (which in my opinion is kind of crucial) but we got some work done:
Unfortunately we ditched the scissors idea. We had no idea how we would keep the scissors in place and how to make the scissors cut the string on its own. It would be too hard to have something accurately hit the scissors without either missing or sending them flying.
But for some time we decided on our basic design. We still don't really know how to hold all of this up (which in my opinion is kind of crucial) but we got some work done:
Marble on inclined plane. Marble blocked by wall controlled by pulley. Put weight in pulley. Wall moves up. Marble rolls down plane. Marble rolls down corkscrew pipe. Marble hits flag. Flag falls on dominoes. Dominoes hits car. Car rolls down inclined plane. Hits cup with marble in it. Marble falls down "Pachinko-like" chute. Falls on seesaw-like thing and rolls down and hits left side of another seesaw-like thing. Right side of seesaw is connected to wheel and axle. Wheel and axle turns with Kool-Aid package connected to it. Kool-Aid dumps out contents of package. Congrats. Now you have Kool-Aid.
Of course, there are some things we need to think of.
Do we want to add more? Can we stabilize a toy car without an emergency brake (lol) on an inclined plane? Will the cup accidentally fall down the Pachinko thing with the marble? Do dominoes have enough force to push a car? How will the over excessive amount of Kool-Aid we need to buy affect our budget? How much Kool-Aid can we drink before getting sick? HOW DO WE HOLD UP THE WHOLE THING?
XD, well this is going to be REALLY interesting.
Of course, there are some things we need to think of.
Do we want to add more? Can we stabilize a toy car without an emergency brake (lol) on an inclined plane? Will the cup accidentally fall down the Pachinko thing with the marble? Do dominoes have enough force to push a car? How will the over excessive amount of Kool-Aid we need to buy affect our budget? How much Kool-Aid can we drink before getting sick? HOW DO WE HOLD UP THE WHOLE THING?
XD, well this is going to be REALLY interesting.