Cardboard Chairs
For this project, we made chairs out of cardboard only. No glue, tape or anything except for cardboard. At first, I thought it would be almost impossible to make chairs just out of cardboard. But then, I looked on Google Images and saw that there are almost unlimited ways to make a cardboard chair. Initially, it would be for the house that we built, but they wouldn't fit so we just either threw them out or took them home. So first, we had to make a chair for a 150 pound high schooler, but then Mr. Williams said that it could be made for a toddler that weighs about 25 pounds because we didn't have enough cardboard of 15 different full size chairs.
There were a couple of different components that Mr. Williams was judging us on. They are function, structure, economy, and aesthetics. A couple groups did Google Docs, but we just winged our presentation. This project was coupled by the electronics experiments and the Programming, and since I worked a lot on the programming, then we didn't really get any work on cardboard chairs done. We only worked on the chairs for about 6 hours at the most.We got the prototype done, but we didn't do the actual chair.
Before we made a blueprint for the chair, we did a tensile strength and compression lab. In this lab, we tested the tensile strength of different shapes to see what of shape would be the strongest. Then we did a compression lab where we tested different paper cylinders and tested what would hold the most weight. What I learned is that triangles take the most effort to rip apart and that the wider the cylinder, the more weight it can hold up. After the experiment, we started designing our chairs. At first we couldn't figure out an idea, but then we agreed and then we cut up manila folders to make our prototype. That is basically how far we got with this project because both Kyle and I had to finish programming and it was just Jacob that was working on it. Below is the picture of the prototype we made. As you can see, it can hold up 500 grams because we put cylinders under the chair. It looks more like a lawn chair than a regular chair.
There were a couple of different components that Mr. Williams was judging us on. They are function, structure, economy, and aesthetics. A couple groups did Google Docs, but we just winged our presentation. This project was coupled by the electronics experiments and the Programming, and since I worked a lot on the programming, then we didn't really get any work on cardboard chairs done. We only worked on the chairs for about 6 hours at the most.We got the prototype done, but we didn't do the actual chair.
Before we made a blueprint for the chair, we did a tensile strength and compression lab. In this lab, we tested the tensile strength of different shapes to see what of shape would be the strongest. Then we did a compression lab where we tested different paper cylinders and tested what would hold the most weight. What I learned is that triangles take the most effort to rip apart and that the wider the cylinder, the more weight it can hold up. After the experiment, we started designing our chairs. At first we couldn't figure out an idea, but then we agreed and then we cut up manila folders to make our prototype. That is basically how far we got with this project because both Kyle and I had to finish programming and it was just Jacob that was working on it. Below is the picture of the prototype we made. As you can see, it can hold up 500 grams because we put cylinders under the chair. It looks more like a lawn chair than a regular chair.
Concepts
Tensile Strength: resistance to breaking under tension
Economy: little supplies
Aesthetics: chair looking good
If we had time, we could have made a chair that could have held an adult. But alas, we didn't.
Reflection
This project was one of the worst in this year for a couple of different reasons. One reason as I keep complaining about, my group didn't have time to do electronics experiments, programming, and cardboard chairs. To fix that I could have concentrated more, or practice time management. Another reason this was a bad experiment was that my group didn't get along a lot. The last reason why this was a bad project for my group was that we had trouble concentrating.
But there is some good that came out of this project. One thing was that I had fun in this project. Another reason was that I got to see different designs my classmates came up with and some of them were cool. So this was the cardboard chairs project of STEM Marin 2014.
Tensile Strength: resistance to breaking under tension
Economy: little supplies
Aesthetics: chair looking good
If we had time, we could have made a chair that could have held an adult. But alas, we didn't.
Reflection
This project was one of the worst in this year for a couple of different reasons. One reason as I keep complaining about, my group didn't have time to do electronics experiments, programming, and cardboard chairs. To fix that I could have concentrated more, or practice time management. Another reason this was a bad experiment was that my group didn't get along a lot. The last reason why this was a bad project for my group was that we had trouble concentrating.
But there is some good that came out of this project. One thing was that I had fun in this project. Another reason was that I got to see different designs my classmates came up with and some of them were cool. So this was the cardboard chairs project of STEM Marin 2014.