For our assessment in science semester 2 term 4, 3 peers (Royce, Tim, and Shray) and I teamed up to tackle a very challenging task. Our task was to create an earthquake-resistant tower above 60cm and within a 30×30 cm width. But the twist is… We had to make it out of spaghetti! We were also assigned this task with the limitations and cost of each item. The items being only spaghetti and blue tac, Spaghetti would cost $1 for every 10 cm of spaghetti and $1 for every gram of blue-tac. This pricing ensured us that we would have to be extra cost-efficient when going through the design and built process, so lots of planning would be necessary.
Starting off this project, we came up with the idea of building a pyramid-based tower with a singular foundation in the middle (source 1). This Idea was made by my friend Shray in the group, He did some research at home and looked at earthquake-resistant buildings before, This idea was almost immediately shot down with the price limitations, (with a bit of arguing in the meantime). We knew that this task would be challenging, and we would have to put our minds together if we want to succeed.
Our second idea was to build a dome, this was a bulletproof plan, it provided a very sturdy and strong base. This 30cm dome was very stable and it was within 30x30cm width. Then it hit us, we realized that it needed to be 60cm tall and it would be WAY too expensive to make it 60cm, so another idea was shot down.
Tim, came up with the amazing idea of using cross braces to add extra stability to a regular pyramid tower. We made the building, but we didn’t quite reach the height limit, so we put a strand of spaghetti to reach 60cm (source 3). We realized that we made a perfect building, but we were over budget by $1.34, but Mr. Goor allowed it.
After all our hard work, it was time to do our first testing, so we put it on the board, with much anticipation, Mr. Goor began shaking the table. The results came out to be pretty well, but our building was strong but not strong enough, 1 spaghetti strand fell out. We knew what we had to do and that we should definitely make adjustments and improvements.
Royce and I came up with the idea of using isosceles triangle braces instead of cross braces, the reason for this is because triangle braces will be a lot more cost-efficient and naturally a stronger design than the previous one, This idea was also necessary as we wouldn’t need such a long strand of spaghetti at the top as the building would be taller than the cross braces. This change would hopefully produce the outcome of our building to be sturdier and more stable.
With the adjustments made, our building was ready for the second testing. So, he began shaking. Our building was not budging, our plan was going perfect, it was as stable as stable could be. We get through the regular test without a single change in our building but then, Mr. Goor asked if we wanted to test our building in the impossible test, and we said yes… And it still was alive. This testing gives us the research needed to help us understand the most cost-efficient and sturdy models for building earthquake-proof buildings. The change of the different shaped braces was also a reason why our building was very sturdy according to the video.
The roles of our group
Royce: The Leader and the calculator
Royce was agreeably the smartest out of the group, he excelled in math and science, shown by him being in the specialist year 10 course while being in year 9. We used his strengths to calculate the costs and portions of the spaghetti which fit his role perfectly. If we did not have Royce, our whole team would fall apart. Royce was in charge of investigating the cost components of our building.
Shray: The walking idea generator
Out of our group, Shray and I were probably the most creative, but Shray excelled in thinking outside the box, Shray being strong in subjects like English and HASS really helped him become our strong idea generator, if it were not for his role, we wouldn’t have the idea of using cross braces or making a triangle-based tower. His awesome and astonishingly creative mind helped drive our team to success. Shray was in charge of investigating the building design components to provide ideas that would make the building as stable as possible.
Tim: The creative modeler and architect
Tim was a very important and crucial member of our group. Tim would be the jigsaw puzzle that connected all of us together, he took our designs/models and created it in real life, he would be the team member that took our sketches and turned them into models with the architecture skills he learned from his woodwork classes in All Saints College. Tim was in charge of investigating the height limit and how we could surpass that height limit while still being stable. Without Tim, we would be hopeless when it came to making the design.
Now you may be wondering “Thenuk What did you do? It seems that they did everything, were you useless?” WRONG, my role as a team member for this group was to be the logistics and reality checker, this would mean that I was the person who looks over our ideas and design, then evaluated them to see if it will be a viable option, given the limitations of the project.
Reflection
Reflecting on our term-long collaboration, our teamwork was always well as we were friends outside this group. We worked somewhat effectively during each class managing to meet the deadlines proposed by our teacher. Tim and Shray demonstrated their creativity and research skills through the designing stage, where they came up with many ideas. I was able to keep our ideas in check, by not making us go too far into a silly idea, befitting the name of “Reality Check”. And Royce led us to success.
Changes we could make
Looking at the engineering process, I believe that we could change how we tackled our brainstorm process, the particular reason for this is because we did not have a solid idea and we rushed into the creation process of this task, I think we were a bit too hasty as we eagerly wanted to build our prototype. If we made this change I think our design process would be perfect
Overall, This engineering task taught me a lot about what it takes to build a structure, it doesn’t just require, sketching and building, it requires a lot of designing and processing before even your first test model can be created. Thinking back to the engineering process, I think that we could have spent a bit more time in the research process than we should as we needed to consolidate an idea. This project helped and enhanced my teamwork and collaboration skills and also helped me understand the importance of splitting up work and assigning roles. I would definitely do this task again.
