Spaghetti and Gumdrop Tower Competition

TheQuailman

TheQuailman

Active member
For my physics class, we each get two bags of gumdrops and a box of spaghetti and we need to make a tower at least 25 cm high that holds the max amount of weight. The height and weight get multipied together and the higher the score the more extra credit points you get.

Has anyone else done this before or can give me some ideas on what to do?
 
do you have to cook the spagetti? cuz that would suck

just use the gumdrops as support and spagettit as the walls of the tower
 
One thing would be soaking the spaghetti in water until the surface of the pieces gets soft. Grab 10-15 pieces and squeeze them together. There is a sort of "glue" on the surface of the pieces that will stick them together. Using the gumdrops as connectors, make a bunch of triangles, and then find a way to stack them up to whatever height you can. Also one other thing, the shorter the strands of spaghetti you use, the harder it will be for them to break under compression.
 
i would try to make the base with a lot shorter pieces of spaghetti, and pretty wide. then as you go up lengthen the spaghetti a little so you can get more bonus.
 
We did clay and straws in my engineering class last semester. I think one of the best systems would be to always use a small pack of spaghetti in the gumdrops. I'd make a base in square, probably half a piece of spaghetti on each side but layered so that each side is two halves right next to each other or maybe 3 or more. never use a full length piece of spaghetti. halfs and maybe even quarters will make a much stronger. So basically just build-up cubes with at least two sections on each side and a cross brace going up one section at at time. And try to make every piece the smae length to increase stability. and then once the stability seems to start going, just brace it more by making lengths come off the second story and connect ot the table.
 
one piece of advice that i have for you from my physics class project i had to do in hs. we had to build a bridge out of spaghetti and it had to hold 5 lbs or something while being as light as possible. 45 degree angles form the strongest joints.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top