Nasa Crane Research Paper

NASA Crane The first project that I chose was the NASA Crane engineering challenge. The purpose of this project was to attempt to create a crane from materials provided, but lift the most weight. We also took ratings on how efficient the design was, the look of the design, and the strength of the design. We first looked at the need of the project. NASA is wanting to, in the future, bring cranes to the moon to extract different materials. The problem would be getting it there. They need a crane that will be capable of lifting very heavy amounts, but at the same time not take that many materials so it can be easier transported. The first thing me and my partner Matthew did was brainstormed ideas about what the design could be. We made a few
Because we started this project a little too late, we did not bring any bridges to the actual contest, but we still followed most of the guidelines that they came up with. The goal was to make a bridge that could hold the most weight but also it needed to be light.The bridge had to span over 48 inches. My partners were Kat and Ema. At first, we started to think of designs to make a bridge. Our first design, after calculating how much wood it was going to take, came out to be a very large amount of wood that we could not use. Even though we trashed the idea, we kept the base idea that we had because it was pretty efficient. After around two more designs, we came up with a bridge that would not take that much wood and we believed that it would hold a good amount of weight. The first thing we did was cut out all of our pieces that we needed to create the bridge, this took a long time to calculate and to cut the right size pieces. At the same time of us finishing cutting all our of pieces, a new rule came into play that we could create smaller bridges to span over 12 inches. We cut every piece we had into ¼ of the size. We began creating our design but due to the glue not being very good and a lack of time, we did not finish. We still tested our design and it ended up being one of the best bridges that was made in our class. We decided that if we would have tried this again, we would use our time more wisely. I liked how we were able to make our own design, and how we could use a good amount of wood to create it. I also liked that we were not rushed to do this project. One thing that I would change is that we need to focus on one project at a time. This would allow us to make better designs. I would also change the type of glue that we used because it did not hold very well. The last thing that I would change is that I would like to pick my partners in the