Rube-Goldberg Project
By: Cleveland May David Otten Matt Alley Alex Mavrommatis
The Team
Overview
• Design and build a Rube-Goldberg device
that will perform a simple task of your choosing.
• Our goal: To make a mouse trap alarm, when trap is sprung.
Overview Cont.
Steps:
1. Mouse trap, when sprung, initiates arm.
2. Arm swings around 270° and hits golf ball.
3. Golf ball rolls down track.
4. Half way down track golf ball hits chime.
Energy Conversions
1. The mouse trap applies a force of 9N up when sprung. (measured with scale)
2. The arm then has an vi.
3. After finding the vi it is
used in the COE to
find its vf just before
hitting the golf ball.
Energy Conversions
4. After the ball is hit it then has a vi which can be found using the COM.
5. The velocity of the ball right before it hits the chime can be found using the COE.
6. The velocity of the ball
just before it hits the end
can also be found using
the COE. (Eloss from hitting the chime is negligible)
Initial Measurements
• Mouse Trap: Force= 9N
• Arm: 12” long
Mass= .037 Kg
• Golf Ball: Mass= .0459 Kg
Initial height= 12” above datum
• Wind-chime: 12” down track
• Track: 23” long
Conclusion
It took a little bit of adjustment, but we got
it to work just the way we wanted. It was cool
to be able to design something that should
work on paper, and actually have it work
when it was built.