Friday, March 25, 2011

Egg Drop Challenge: Iteration 1

2) Total # of Achievements Earned: 11

3) Post an image of your Egg Drop solution.





4) Justify (list and explain) your Achievemtns. Use images as appropriate. For organization's sake, use the categories provided in the Egg Drop Achievement List.


Brainstorming

-Create a sketch of one possible solution. Include labels.
-Create a sketch of another possible solution. Include labels.
-Create a sketch of a third possible solution. Include labels

My group wrote three possible solutions on a piece of paper. One of them was just an egg with aluminum foil wrapped around it, forming a big ball of foil. The second one was a parachute. You would put the egg in a small dixie cup, then there would be a piece of aluminum foil to make it look like a parachute. Our last solution was just a pillow and we would drop an egg on it.

Material Prep

-Generate a list of materials required for build day.

Material Size:

-Your materials fit inside a printer paper box
-Your materials fit inside a shoe box

Drop Accuracy:

-You hit the butcher paper!
-You hit the Bullseye!

We laid a pillow on the bullseye, then when we dropped the egg, it hit the pillow.

Egg Resilience:

-Your egg didn't break in any way! (awarded three times)
-Your egg didn't break in any way! (awarded three times)
-Your egg didn't break in any way! (awarded three times)

5) What designs from your class did well? Based on the achievements you earned, how would you redesign your solution to score better? Be specific (sketches with labeling work well for this).

-Some designs that worked out were just wrapping the egg into something or making a parachute.
-Our solution was great, since the egg didn't break. The only thing wrong was that we didn't earn any achievements in the weight category.

Friday, March 18, 2011

TED Challenge - Part II

A) Summarize the talk. Get to the heart of what makes the issue exciting and noteworthy.

-The video our group chose was 7 ways video games engage the brain. The speaker, Tom Chatfield, explains how people find videogames to be rewarding and how it can make us work harder.
-The video applies to anyone who enjoys playing videogames.

B) Explain the relevance of the subject matter to our class.

-The video relates to our class because our class is Engineering design and designing is a part of making videogames.

C) Explain how a student could get involved in the field in question in the future.

-A student can get involved by taking designing courses or by being an animator.

Tuesday, March 15, 2011

TED pt I - Ideas worth Spreading?




1) What is the TED organization about?

The TED organization is about sharing ideas with the world. They share ideas about whatever they like, and prepare presentations about them explaining what they are trying to teach.

2) What is the purpose of their website and how does the functionality of their site support that?

The purpose is to bring new ideas and share what they feel about them. The functionality of their site supports it by showing videos about a lot of things and separating them into different categories.

3) As Engineers and Problem Solvers, which topic areas (the choices from the "Show talks related to:" section on the sidebar) are of most interest to us? Justify your answer.

The categories that are the most relevent to our class are the design and technology ones, mainly because our class is Engineering design and we use computers.

4) Based on your previous answer, what are 3 talks (videos) on the site that appear like they would be of most interest to you as an Engineer/Problem Solver? Justify your choices.

1.) Amber Case: We are all cyborgs now
2.) Cynthia Breazeal: The rise of personal robots
3.) Bart Weetjens: How I taught rats to sniff out land mines
These three videos seemed like they were the most interesting out of all the videos I looked through. They teach us about how technology is so advanced now, and how we are able to amazing things that we weren't able to do years ago.

5) Each student will watch a unique video. Claim your video on the following period specific posts: 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th. If no one else has claimed your video, leave a comment on that post to call the one you want. If someone else has already claimed the talk, go back and pick another one. Watch the video. Embed the video in your blog post and create a bulletized outline of the key issues presented in the talk.

6) How could you get involved in the field/technology/issue you chose to hear about? What experience/skills/training/education would you need to learn to get involved with this field?

The video I chose was the one about how we are cyborgs now. It doesn't really have an issue, but to be able to talk about it, you would probably need experience in the field of engineering and design. You would need to learn about what goes into making a cyborg and what a cyborg really is.

Tuesday, March 8, 2011

Reverse Engineering: Mechanicnal Product - Functional Analysis

1. What is the purpose or primary function of the object?

The primary function of a laptop is to use the internet and and to do other things such as listening to music, watching videos, playing games, and typing up things like essays.

2. Make an educated guess as to how this product operates. Use simple machines’ terminology to explain the object’s sequential operation.

The product operates by having some parts inside of a computer that make it able to turn on and work. like a computer chip. You use a keyboard to type, and a touch pad to move the cursor around.

3. Identify the system inputs, intended product function, and outputs. Use power point to create a "black box" graphic like the toothbrush example discussed in class. Save the slide as a .jpg image and post it to answer this question.




4. What mechanical components are visible?

Some visible components are the keyboard, the screen, the mouse, the CD drive, the speakers, and the power button.

5. What is it about this device’s function that you cannot identify, because the mechanical components are hidden from plain view?

Most of the things located on a laptop or computer cannot be seen. The computer chips are inside of the computer, and everything used to make it work is located inside.