The Great Egg Drop Week 2

Alex and I have made incredible progress in just one week. We have revised our problem definition, built our contraption and tested it once (from a height more than just two inches)!

Our new problem definition is: Our clients chickens are laying eggs at heights less than or equal to 17 feet. She is having trouble collecting the eggs because they are breaking once they hit the ground.

We are here to help her with the problem and that is why we are building this contraption to catch her falling eggs.

You saw in my last post our design layout and all of our planning. This week we put everything together realizing a few things. First, it made more sense for us to have a square foundation because it gave our basket more support when the egg falls in. Then instead of using one basket design, we used both designs together for more cushion for the egg. Finally, we completely got rid of the top of our contraption (the funneled top). This helped us with our budget and cost of the contraption.

In the pictures below, our foundation is composed of four triangles made from straw and taped together. Our basket was created by using straws cut into thirds with a tape drape interior.

With our first test, we used the plum bob to make sure we got it exactly in the basket. Alex was our handy dandy egg dropper and if she wasn't so nervous she would have made it in, but she missed it by a hair and our egg hit the corner of the basket and cracked. However, next week we will definitely make it inside our basket unharmed!

Alex and I have come a long way since last week and we are definitely going to succeed! We have built this contraption by bouncing and feeding off of each others ideas. I couldn't be more proud of our team!