by: Andrew Benson
posted Apr 18, 2018, 9:21 AM by Sarah Jones [ updated Apr 18, 2018, 9:22 AM ]
Lower the sails! Battle Positions! ARRR! A’ Vast Ye Mateys! Are You Ready Kids!
The Rube Goldberg team will be traveling to the Chicago Museum of Science and Industry. The team will try to fundraise for the trip to make it down there. The team itself has been composed of several thinkers and around seven builders to create the pirate themed machine. This year’s team was tasked to create a machine that would pour a bowl of cereal. The group is eligible to go to the National competition because of their excellent performance at the regional meet.
The regional meet was held at the University of Wisconsin-Stout. The event had 6 high schools competing to move on to the national level. Each high school had taken on the challenge of pouring the bowl of cereal in different ways and themes. The machine itself must within certain parameters. The Elk Mound team is barely under the max requirement and when standing next to it on its platform it is almost 7 feet tall. The massive size of the machine is necessary to get to the 75 step limit. The competing schools at the regional competition had machines with themes such as a kitchen, bedroom and the great outdoors. The EMHS team decided a pirate theme to avoid having the same theme as others.
The machine itself will have to be transported all the way to Chicago in a trailer and the team has to be careful during the 4.5 hour trip. The work the team put in before will still continue on the machine and improvements can always be made. The Elk Mound team will be put to the test when they face the best teams in the nation on April 28th, 2018.