Our Process

Learning About Rube Goldberg: Earlier in the year, we were introduced to Rube Goldberg by our teacher. She used it to teach us about the Engineering Design Process. At that time we were challenged to work with a partner to develop a 15 step Rube Goldberg Machine and include at least one of each of the six simple machines in our design with the goal of cracking a walnut. We had so much fun with the project that we decided we wanted to join the official competition.

Team Brainstorm: It took us some time to get started. We began by talking about which design features we liked from our first project that we wanted to include in this design. Next, we decided for each team member to come up with four steps for the machine and then we would combine them together. We had some trouble coming up with ideas on our own, so we went back to working together. We also decided our goal was to reach at least 40 steps for the machine knowing the minimum for our division is 20 steps.

Determining Our Steps: Using the large white board in our classroom, we began sketching our design. As we worked, we tracked our proposed steps on a step list in a Google Document. We took pictures of our sketches and hung these up in our workspace when it was time to create the machine. [SEE PHOTOS BELOW]

Prototyping: We conducted various experiments for some of the steps we had thought of to make sure they would be viable within our rube Goldberg machine as a whole.

Building our Machine: Even though we had a plan in place, it took us much longer than expected to actually make our design. We had to make some design adjustments as we worked and in the end had to cut out some of our steps. In total, we spent 30 hours building our final machine working during our assigned class periods.

Challenges Faced: We faced three major challenges with this project.

1. Our teacher had to quarantine for being a close contact due to COVID. This meant she was not at school supervising and supporting us for two weeks. While we certainly worked on the project during this time, it wasn't the same as having her there to keep us on track. She joined our class via Webex but was limited in how to support us.

2. We were up against a school deadline of completing this project before our school went to Spring Break on March 5. Despite the many hours invested in this project, we just ran out of time at the end to continue the original steps we had planned. We finally made the decision to stop at 30 steps (instead of our original 40).

3. We ran out of time to refine our machine so that it would work without human intervention. After 17 test runs, we finally had to record our final videos. We worked late into the night to complete the recordings. Overall, we spent about 40 hours during the school day on this project.