Anyways - Research workshop

As a starting point for the brief that would be set after that day, we took part in a workshop that acted as a study task for the later project. The workshop was based on the Rube Goldberg Machine which is about 'creating an invention that uses a chain reaction to accomplish a very simple task in a very complicated manner.'

The emphasis is on the journey rather than the outcome. 

Relevance to course: 

• creativity
• ideas
• collaboration
• problem solving
• planning
• testing/trialing
• creating a narrative
• documenting 

Examples

The brief

The task is to pop a balloon using this method and the submission is a performance of this happening. 

Our group

Hannah Rice

Sophie Rose

Emma Shuffleton

Workshop outcome

This was our area to work with:

Mechanism 1-2

Mechanism 1 was a paper ramp that we created to balance on a cardboard X and a small slanted block in order for a ping pong ball to fall down. The ball was balanced on the bottom of an up turned cup which was elevated slightly in order for the ball to be able to fall down. The ball goes down the ramp which then hits a block to cause mechanism 2 which is a domino effect to set off. 

 

Mechanism 3-4

After we had figured out mechanisms 1 and 2 we realised we needed something to hit the ping pong ball. This meant that an initial chain reaction needed to be created. We created a tube for a tennis ball to pass through using card and lots of tape to hold this in place. We elevated the tube for a tennis ball to pass through using card and tape to hold in place and elevated the tube to create the slope. This then hit a block attached to string which swings around, hitting the ball - the bar assisting the direction of the swing. 

Mechanisms 5-6

The blocks falling over then lead to a small ramp to lead onto mechanism 5. This a pulling mechanism in which a small roll of sellotape falls into a cup once it has rolled down the ramp. The cup is attached to string and when weighed down the cup drops down and kick starts the next part of the chain reaction. This is mechanism number 6 - a spoon attached to a block getting knocked off of the shelf by the falling cup.

 

Mechanism 7

The block on one end fo the seesaw allows for the other end to drop and the ball will then roll to the other end. The ball is guided by two metal rods which will allow it to then drop into a tube taped to the end of the shelf. 

 

 

 

We had a few issues developing the final mechanism which would be used to pop the balloon. Force needed to be created when landing on the balloon in order for it to pop, but because the ballon was on the bottom shelf we were unsure on how to go about this. Our initial idea was to create another pulling mechanism that would cause something to fly up and hit the balloon. The image below shows the mechanism we created and in order for this to work we had to remove the tube on the side of the shelf. Instead, another cup mechanism was placed there for a ball to fall into. The issue we found with this was that the lid didn't stay straight hence wouldn't hit the balloon. 

Mechanism 8 

Instead of this initial idea we adapted it to put pins on the bottom of a cup that when the ball falls into the cup it would fly down and hit the balloon underneath it. This was a good idea but the issue with this was that the cup wasn't high enough to create enough momentum - the balloon did not pop. We needed a stronger and faster force or this mechanism form a higher height if we were to continue to develop this Rube Goldberg machine. 

Final attempts

When it came to the final tests of the whole mechanism, we had a few issues of which we did not have at any of the testing stages of the workshop. Mechanism 4 was causing us a problem as the block attached to the string didn't hit the ping pong ball and if it did it hit in the wrong direction. the one time that the ball did hit in the right direction, the spoon mechanism let us down. We eventually just pushed the ball down the ramp to set off the rest of the chain reaction.