Author: Luna Stankus

ENGINEERING TASK

It is challenging for stray animals to survive extreme weather conditions. Your task is to design a prototype of an animal house that will help stray animals survive extreme weather conditions common to where you live—rain storms, really hot and really cold temperatures, earthquakes, or tornados.

DID YOU KNOW…?

• Only 1 out of every 10 dogs born will find a permanent home.
• The main reasons animals are in shelters: owners give them up, or animal control finds them on the street.
• Many strays are lost pets that were not kept properly indoors or provided with identification.
• It’s impossible to determine how many stray dogs and cats Iive in the United States. Estimates for cats alone range up to 70 million.
• Source: dosomething.org

MATERIALS IN KIT

• 20 Popsicle sticks
• 10 Aluminum foil sheets
• 30 Cotton balls
• 1 Deck of playing cards
• 4-5 Felt pieces
• 15 Thumbtacks
• Yarn
• Scissors
• Masking tape
• Measuring tape
• 2 Thermometers
• Cardboard base 3

STEP 1—RESEARCH

What are the elements to keep an animal warm in winters and cool in summers? Think about wall isolation, roof design, and other feature that would make an animal house useful and offer protections against other weather conditions. Here are some videos to get you started and be sure to take notes about what you notice and might use in

your own design.
https://youtu.be/d6xLYlg8qm8
https://youtu.be/0anNT4yVH08
https://youtu.be/9HH9HsP1TPI

STEP 2—PLAN

Based on your research, brainstorm and sketch 2-3 detailed designs of your animal house. List or label the materials you will use. You will build your house on a piece of cardboard.

How will the structure of the house withstand weather conditions where you live (e.g., wind, rain, snow)?

MATERIALS IN YOUR HOME
DID YOU KNOW…?

Newspapers can be used in your prototype as a form of structure and support. The key is to take one sheet of newspaper and roll it tightly from one corner to another.

MATERIALS IN YOUR HOME—
SCAVENGER HUNT

In addition to using materials from the kit, you can find items inside and outside your house that start with the letters below. Only one object per letter, but you can have more than one of that object. For example, for the letter L, you can use 30 leaves. Be strategic.

STEP 3—CREATE

Pick one of your designs
from Step 2 and build your prototype. You can only use materials in the kit and those you gathered from the scavenger hunt.

STEP 4—TEST (TEMPERATURE)

Place the animal house outside. Place one thermometer inside the animal house and the other thermometer outside the animal house. Read the temperature of both thermometers at least seven times over a 12-hour period. Document the time (in minutes) and temperatures in the table on the next page. Is the temperature inside the house more than, less than, or the same as the temperature outside the house? Why? How does the inside temperature reflect how you designed the animal house?

STEP 4—TEST (WIND)

Do you think your animal house can withstand a windstorm for 8 seconds? Why or why not? If it is a windy day, place your house outside to test. If it is not a windy day, use a hair dryer on full speed to simulate the windstorm.

STEP 4—TEST (RAIN/SNOW)

How well will the animal house withstand rain and/or snow? Pour water onto the roof of your house using a watering can. Wait! You don’t have a watering can? Let’s make one. Use a thumbtack to punch holes into a bottle cap.

STEP 5—REFLECT & IMPROVE

How would you rate your prototype on a five-star scale?

What things did you consider for your five-star rating?
What “tag line” captures your rating (e.g., “Built well. Animals of all kinds will enjoy.”)

What improvements would you make? Why? What did you learn from your testing results? How can we make these improvements with the materials that we have?

PARALLEL PROTOTYPE

Choose another design from Step 2, create another prototype and test it in the same manner. How would you rate this house? Why? Based on your tests, which house is more likely to withstand different weather conditions?

DID YOU KNOW…?

Structural engineers design the “bones and muscles” for man-made structures such a buildings, bridges, and tunnels. It is their responsibility to calculate the stability and strength for things such as snow, wind, and earthquake forces. Can you identify these famous building designs?

ENGINEERING TASK

Grabbers are handheld tools that can be used to retrieve items from a distance. Watch the following video for more information:

https://youtu.be/_gw6FlLANtA

Design a prototype of a grabber that can pick up three different objects from at least two feet away without damaging or dropping them.

MATERIALS IN KIT

• Scissors
• Electrical Tape
• ~3 feet of cotton twine
• 10 rubber bands
• 4 binder clips
• 4 straws
• 4 pipe cleaners
• 5 jumbo popsicle sticks
• 2 hair ties
• 6 large fasteners

PROTOTYPE

Prototype is a term we will use often, so what does it mean? One way to think of a prototype is a rough draft on a paper. Here are two videos that explain a prototype in engineering.

https://youtu.be/_1bOaNSy5XY
https://youtu.be/k_9Q-KDSb9o

STEP 1—RESEARCH

Did you know engineers design robotic grabber arms for individuals who are not able to use their arms to pick up objects or for garbage trucks to pick up garbage bins? How do they do that?

As a family, search for news stories and videos using such phrases as “engineers that develop robotic arms”, “mechanical arm for garbage truck”, or “robotic hand for humans.” Here is one video to get you started.

https://youtu.be/WxCDZquT2Yk

Take notes on what you notice about the design of the arms and/or hands.

MATERIALS IN YOUR HOME—SCAVENGER HUNT

Now you need materials for the “body” of the grabber. As a family, find items around your house that start with the letters below. Only one object per letter, but you can have more than one of that object. For example, for the letter P, you can use 5 plastic bottles. Be strategic. We suggest recyclable materials.

B D E H L N P S T W

STEP 2—PLAN

Who is your user? What do you want your grabber to grab? Think about at least 3 items in your home and consider the texture, size, weight, and shape of the objects.

Next, using your research notes, draw 3 different designs of grabbers. For each design, list or label the materials you will use. You can only use the materials in the kit and from the scavenger hunt.

STEP 3—CREATE

Pick one of your designs from Step 2 and a prototype. What is an appropriate name for your grabber? Think about the purpose of the grabber.

STEP 4—TEST

Use your grabber to pick up three items in your home from at least two feet away. Since your grabber may be long, make sure you test in a space that has plenty of room. You don’t want to accidentally hit other or knock things over!! Don’t lift breakable items or any hot/dangerous objects.

STEP 5—IMPROVE

How well did your grabber pick up three items in your home from at least two feet away?

1. Can others in your family use the grabber?
2. What improvements might be made? Why do
   you think this?
   Make any changes and test your grabber again.
   Continue to test and redesign until you are happy
   with your grabber.

STEP 6—PARALLEL PROTOTYPE

Try another design from Step 2. Do each step again—Create, Test, and Improve.

STEP 6—CHALLENGES

We also have a few challenges for you to consider:

• How many different types of items can one of your grabbers pick up? What do these items have in common?
• Design a grabber that can hand someone a water bottle across the room while you are both sitting.
• Combine elements of your three designs from Step 2 into a mega-grabber.
• Make up your own challenge. Don’t forget to start with planning your design.

DID YOU KNOW?

Different types of engineers are needed to plan, create, test, and improve robots including robotic arms—mechanical engineers work on the body, electrical engineers work on the nervous system or the electrical components (e.g., circuits), and computer science engineers work on the brain or the computer program that tells the robot what to do. If you are interested in learning more, check out this video.

DID YOU KNOW…?

A car that is energy efficient can travel farther on the same amount of gas, which saves the driver money and decreases air pollution. Also, gasoline is made from oil, which is a non-renewable energy source. This means that when it is used up, no more is available. For these reasons, engineers are continually figuring out ways to make cars more energy efficient. Aerodynamics is one example (see https://youtu.be/AXjiThF1LXU for more information.)

ENGINEERING TASK

The automobile company, Rolls-Royce, has produced many cars that are considered of poor fuel efficiency by the United States Department of Energy. Similar to automotive engineers, your task is to build a prototype to test the effect of different variables to report recommendations to the company. The prototype should travel along a straight path down a ramp and travel as far as possible with a minimum of 8 feet.

VARIABLES

What are variables you might ask? Let’s explore this with an interactive video that uses MythBuster experiments to explain.

MATERIALS IN KIT

• 12 Lifesavers Mints (individually wrapped)
  10 index cards
• 8 straws
• 8 toothpicks
• 20 popsicle sticks
• Masking tape
• Scissors
• Tape measure
• 30 pennies
• Items around your home

STEP 1—RESEARCH

What can we learn from others? Let’s watch a few videos to find out. Stop the videos as needed to take notes on what you notice that you might include in your own designs.

https://youtu.be/rVVB0-6Zgq0
https://youtu.be/SW9lBhgh5SE
https://youtu.be/KMUncKor7FY

STEP 2—PLAN

Brainstorm and sketch 2-3 car designs. For each, make a list of materials and you can only use material from the kit in your design. How do you think the body of the car will make a difference?

STEP 3—CREATE

Pick one of your designs from Step 2 and build your car prototype. But wait? How are you going to test your prototype? We need a ramp! Determine a location inside or outside your home to test the prototype. Construct a ramp using material from your home environment. How will you secure the ramp?

Does your ramp need support?

STEP 4—PILOT TEST & IMPROVE

Let’s test your prototype by sending it down the ramp 3 times. What did you notice? How far did it travel? Did it travel in a straight line? What can be improved? How is this based on your observations? Make these changes to your prototype. Keep testing and redesigning the prototype until you are satisfied.

STEP 5—TEST #1

Let’s test how weight changes the distance traveled by adding or removing pennies each trial. How many trials? At least six. In this test, what is the independent variable and the dependent variable? Let’s keep track of our test through a table.

Trial #	# of pennies	Distance traveled
1
2

DID YOU KNOW…?

Pennies weigh different amounts depending on the year the penny was made. Pennies made before 1982 are made of 95% copper and 5% zinc. A copper penny weighs 3.11 grams or 0.109702 ounces. Pennies made in the year of 1982 and after are made of 97.5% zinc and 2.5% copper. A zinc penny weighs 2.5 grams or 0.0881849 ounces.
(coincollectingenterprise.com)

STEP 6—TEST #2

Let’s conduct a new test on how the number of wheels change the distance traveled. Make a prediction about what you think will happen to the distance the car will travel based on changes to the wheels. How many trials? At least three. Let’s keep track of our test through a table.

Trial #	# of wheels	Distance traveled
1
2

ADDITIONAL TESTS

There are additional variables that you can consider before making recommendations to Rolls Royce. As an engineer, remember to document your test(s).

• Change the size of the wheel using objects in your home.
• Texture of the wheel. Wrap the wheel with material in your home (e.g., aluminum foil).
• Position and balance of the wheels.

PARALLEL PROTOTYPING

How do you think the body of the car might change your results? Choose another design from Step 2 and replicate or copy your tests. How are your results similar and/or different? For example, might the size of the prototype make a difference (e.g., large truck versus a small sports car)? Support using evidence from your charts and your observations as an engineer.

STEP 7—COMMUNICATE

Based on the results from your tests, what recommendations would you make to Rolls Royce regarding changes they should make to increase their fuel efficiency ratings? Support using evidence from your charts and your observations as an engineer.

DID YOU KNOW…?

• The first engine powered car was built in Mannheim, Germany by Karl Benz in 1885. Between 1888 and 1893 they sold a whopping 25 units.
• On average, every American will spend approximately two whole weeks of their life stopped at red lights.
• The first speeding ticket ever issued was in 1902, when most cars could barely reach 45mph.
• In 1939 the San Antonio Light wrote about future cars that could be folded into a neat and tidy suitcase-sized package. Got that one a little wrong.

For more interesting facts about automotive engineers, check out https://automotive-engineering.weebly.com/index.html

DID YOU ALSO KNOW…?

Mechanical engineers can work in various industries—manufacturing, aeronautics, robotics, oh, and yes, automobiles—as they have an understanding of how machines work. Mechanical engineers are part of a team that designs, tests, and improves parts of a car to pass safety standards. Henry Ford, Karl Benz, and Nikola Tesla were mechanical engineers and known for revolutionizing the automobile industry