Our first Unit of Urban Planning taught us a lot about a mix of Newton's Laws of motion with a mix of physics equations and plotting vectors in different scenarios. After a few weeks of work with the main ideas of how a bridge supports itself through beams and trusses, we went out around downtown Chicago on a joint Field Experience with one of our other Core classes Policy to talk about the making and history behind the city's multiple drawbridges. After a reflection on what a good bridge does both for the support of transportation and aesthetics, we were given our own challenge to see the best bridge we could make with limited materials and time.
The assignment was that you were taking on the role of the city's architect and one of their skyways is about to collapse, your job is to make a new permanent bridge for that gap. In reality, we were given these restraints:
.The bridge has to be built on a diagonal
. You were only given 50 popsicle sticks to build with
. No materials other than hot glue may be used
.It has to at least hold ten pounds
Once the rules were set in place I got to work on finding and designing a bridge that appealed to me. I was unsure in the beginning because I was concerned I wouldn't have enough sticks to complete what I had in mind. In the end, I settled on a Howe box truss, I couldn't put a truss inside of each box but tried to get the closest I could with the final design.
Going through and putting the pieces together I realized I could cut some unwanted popsicle ends and use them as extra smaller trusses and supports. Below is both the final sketch of my bridge, labeling where it would experience compression and tension, labeling where the top and bottom chords of the bridge were located, and the model made as a to-scale reference of the final product.
Bridge Sketch DN 2022
The model took quite a bit of time but it's a good representation of what the bridge looked like and is a more simplified and clear example than the sketch.
Bridge Tinkercad DN 2022
After finishing up the bridge I really started to understand where the most pressure would be piled on and how the top chord of the bridge really helps with how much weight the bridge can bear. I am very proud of how my bridge turned out, I think it would've been nice to add a roof but I ran out of sticks and time by
that point.
Final Model DN 2022
Now that there was a physical model, I could do calculations to figure out some of the angles I'd used to make the internal trusses. The general calculations of the bridge were 20 inches long, 5 inches tall, and 4 and a half inches wide. I ended up using all 50 of the popsicle sticks for the design and all triangles made were right triangles so that made it a bit easier to measure.
With the law of sines and cosines and the given measurements of one of the triangles, we can easily find the angles and lengths of each side. The triangle being solved for is one of the outer supports so a triangle made up of one of the green popsicle sticks leaning on the left and right sides of the frame. To also tackle its potential and kinetic energy I thought it would be better to show my work on one of my notebook pages than to write it all out below.
Energy and Angle Equations DN 2022
PE= .11 J
KE= .78 J
angle A= 22.88 degrees
angle C= 67.12 degrees
What we aim to achieve with most of our Action Projects is to connect it to one of the many Sustainable Development Goals. For this project, we joined SDG 11 because it has everything to do with safe transport and infrastructure. My bridge design addresses this by thinking of the strongest and most efficient way to travel over a highway needing repairs with a sturdy and mindful build and limited resources.
As a wrap-up to the project, we all got to test the limits of our bridges. The video is listed below, my bridge ended up holding 32 pounds! Until we noticed the way too late that the woodblock we were using as a weight was helping the balance out a bit. Easily passed the 10-pound mark though, I am overall very proud of my bridge.
I really enjoyed the creation of this project and the teaching of this Unit all lessons were woven together really well and I feel like overall I wasn't being too stressed by moving from one thing to another with no overview. The project had its struggles but I highly enjoy any chance I get to craft something so I think this went great.
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