The Marbleous Contraption. April 22, 2009

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1 The Marbleous Contraption April 22, 2009 Aaron Curtis: Designer, Builder, Report Tyler Bowland: Designer, Builder, Report Wesley Shepard: Designer, Builder, Report

2 2 Introduction: For our final EF 151 project, we designed a Rube Goldberg experiment involving a complex series of steps to perform a simple task. In our case, we had seven major steps that contributed to the final task of turning on an electronic radio. We decided on this experiment based on what we had easy access to at our houses, dorms, with friends, and what was most cost efficient. A major criteria we had to deal with was how many steps we were going to have, how big we could make it to fit into a 1m cubed box, what electronic device we were going to turn on, what supplies to use, and how much money to spend on supplies. We discarded the idea of using fire, building a sail on a car, and using a weight to turn a switch on. Our design process begins with a marble rolling down a Hotwheels track at different angles. At the bottom of the track, the marble drops into a plastic cup, creating tension on a string, turning on a light switch. This enables a fan to turn on and blow a pinwheel. A string is connected to the pinwheel, which is connected to a Hotwheels car. The string pulls a pin out of the car, releasing the car through a PVC pipe and down a ramp. At the bottom of the ramp, the car hits a button on a toy projectile missile and it shoots the missile, which hits a target. A marble is sitting in a plastic cup, connected to the target. When the missile hits the target, it knocks it over and causes the marble to fall out of the cup and land into a funnel. The marble travels down the funnel, down a foam tube, and hits a power button on a power-strip. This gives power to the electronic radio, successfully completing the experiment. The materials we used were: Hotwheels track, plastic cup, string, light switch, peg board, metal hooks, fan, pinwheel, wood, PVC pipe, electrical tape, wood glue, toy

3 3 projectile missile, marbles, metal funnel, foam tube, power-strip, scissors, saw, electronic radio. Most everything was brought from houses, borrowed from friends, or bought at a cheap price. The wood glue cost six dollars; the electrical tape was twenty-five cents, and the wood itself cost 4 dollars. Every other item was already in our hands. As far as the physics go, there is potential energy at the very beginning before the marble is released. While traveling down the Hotwheels track, the marble has both linear kinetic energy and rotational kinetic energy. There is a force in the string (tension) that causes the light switch to turn on. Once the Hotwheels car is on the track, there is linear velocity, gravitational acceleration, and a friction force between the car and the track. At the moment the car hits the missile button, there is an elastic collision. This causes projectile motion of the missile, hitting the target creating another elastic collision. The marble travels down the funnel with linear and rotational kinetic energy. There is angular momentum as well as it travels down the tube. The elastic collision between the marble and the power-strip turns on the electronic radio. Results: After testing our experiment, we were successful. It took some time to work everything out, but after many trials our experiment worked. Getting enough tension on the string to flip the light switch on was a minor problem. The fan needed to blow hard enough to spin the pinwheel, so it had to be at a reasonable distance away. Also, calculating where the Hotwheels car needed to hit the missile button caused a bit of problems. Finding the angle at which the missile needed to project took a few trials as well. Landing the marble into the funnel caused the most significant problem, because the

4 4 marble balanced on the target is unsteady. It is also the last major step of the experiment so if it doesn t work the whole experiment would be ruined. Conclusion: In conclusion, our Rube Goldberg experiment was successful. It included more steps than necessary, which made it more complicated, but more interesting. We used the concept of projectile motion with the toy missile, which helped us see a real life example of using the trajectory equation. The concept of conservation of energy with the marble and the car, helped us see how potential energy at the top of the experiment relates to both linear and rotational kinetic energy throughout the experiment. The idea of conservation of momentum was displayed through the elastic collision of the car and the missile projectile button, and the marble and the power-strip. The weight of the marble in the cup creates tension in the sting, turning on the light switch. This force was easy to see in our real life experiment. Our experiment was done very easily and did not take much time to build. The only thing we would consider doing differently is to eliminate one or two steps. It s good because it works with all these steps, but it could be a little less complex. References: As far as our references, we mainly just thought of the idea in our head. We googled Rube Goldberg device and saw how to make different parts and what some good ideas would be, but the idea behind it all was original. We found the youtube videos

5 5 very interesting, but we figured our idea was also interesting, original, and met the guidelines for this experiment. Abstract: Our Rube Goldberg device was intended to go through a complex series of steps to turn on an electronic radio. We used concepts such as gravitational potential energy, linear and rotational kinetic energy, projectile motion, force and friction, and conservation of momentum. We had a marble go down a track, had tension turn on a switch, had a fan blow to ultimately release a car down a track, had a car hit a button, had projectile missile hit a target, and had a marble travel down a tube to turn on a switch, turning on the radio. Our results were successful; we had a complicated device do a simple task: turn on a radio.

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The Obstacle Course

The Obstacle Course 12.1.2009 Myles Smith, Troy Holcomb, and Chris Wheeler Team 8 Section: B2 2 Abstract We were asked to create a Rube Goldberg device, which explored and demonstrated different topics