Yeah I know, wrong board to post this, but I need some ideas fast, or a website I can go to. I AM NOT AN ENGINEER! My kid just sprung a last minute project on me that's due tomorrow. He needs to create a simple machine that has a usefull function, i.e., a bird feeder. He doesn't need to use materials, he can put it on paper and brief it from there. It needs to contain the following simple items, and he has to use at least 5 of them. SCREW GEAR(S) PULLEY(S) INCLINE PLANE LEVER(S) WHEEL(S) WEDGE Any Ideas? Smart Ass answers will not be entertained. :lol:
I'm not an engineer, but I play one on another board.... I love Rube Goldberg machines! http://www.rubegoldberg.com/ But I've never set out to make one. Here's a link to a project that looks a lot like yours, http://outreach.rice.edu/~dgabby/science/simp_mach/. Maybe they have some hints. [I had a good picture to put here, but it doesn't come up as animated, so it's no fun.]
Uh, AJ, not to cause trouble, but... I used to fiercely resist that Projects for Parents stuff when my kids were in school...Teachers pulled it all the time...didn't mind helping them study or explaining things to them (when I could understand the stuff) but...
OK...put a small potted plant on a platform inside a cylinder (plastic) of some sort with a gap in the cylinder so that one arm of a LEVER can pass through the cylinder and lie under the platform. (You need the cylinder to keep the pot level...otherwise it will just fall off). Work the lever like a teeter-totter...at first the plant will be heavier, but as it dries up it gets lighter...a weight on the other end of the lever will then take over and lower itself (and raise the potted plant). when the lever gets low enough, it no longer blocks the passage of a little car you make with a block of wood and WHEELS sitting on an INCLINED PLANE so it is freed to run down the plane. A SCREW with a string attached is on the back of the car, running through a PULLEY to release a small platform above the cylinder, that tips a glass of water over and waters the plant. Uses the lever, inclined plane, wheels, screw, and pulley.
OK Try to draw this. 1. Using a pully, haul a large weight up an inclined plane. Drop the weight into a basket which is the end of a lever. The other end of the lever will have a helicopter on it which gets thrown into the air. As the copter decends the rotors turn. Using a gear system have it wave a Husker flag. Didn't bother with the wedge in this concept.
Geez, after reading Stu's and Gippers projects I don't think I have any ideas to top those! :roll: :roll: Good luck.
I just have a few words for you HH… When you engineer a project, you have to think like an Engineer. Three of those devices can be represented by only one. A wedge is an incline plane. A screw is nothing more than an incline plane wrapped around a shaft. So use a screw and you have three of them knocked out. I’m still thinking about the project.
This may not be what you are looking for but is fairly easy to visualize: This simple machine could be a sliding gate on a chain link fence. Picture a chain link fence with a twelve foot opening with a sliding gate that opens and closes the opening. The gate travels on a set of wheels. An inverted wedge (V shaped device) will keep the right side of the gate from swinging by wrapping around the fence post when the gate closes. A lever is used to change the polarity of current flow so that the motor will change directions. Pulleys channel the top tube of the chain link gate to keep it from falling over. A screw can be represented as a worm gear. A worm gear is a screw that is used to change a rotating motion into a linear motion. Think of a screw with a nut on it. The nut is welded to the left bottom corner of the sliding gate. The screw (worm gear) is threaded into the nut with the head of the twelve foot long worm gear out to the left. An electric motor is attached to the far left side of the worm gear. When the motor spins clockwise, the worm gear pulls the gate to the left opening the pathway through the fence. When it spins counter clockwise, it closes the sliding gate.