Summer SAVY 2018: Session 5, Day 4 – Marvelous Mechanisms (Rising 5th/6th)
We continued to hone our drafting skills today, this time with kinematic diagrams of various mechanisms. A kinematic diagram captures the motion of a linkage by representing pins as dots and links as straight lines. We drew a french fry cutter, a letterpress printing press, and a window hinge. Then, just for fun, we drew a graphical proof of the pythagorean theorem.
The open-house is tomorrow, and we are looking forward to sharing our final projects. Each project will be a (mostly pointless) mechanism that uses gears, pulleys, and linkages to accomplish a single actuating task, such as pressing a button or throwing a switch. We took some time to brainstorm different ways the different types of systems could actuate each other. For example, how many different ways can a gear train set a linkage in motion? Many students had some very clever and creative ideas. I am predicting some complex and extravagant project presentations for open house!
Since our class meets in a residence hall, one of the students asked if we could look inside a dorm room. This brief tour resulted in a lively discussion about student life, responsibilities, and opportunities at college. Some students may still have questions that my teaching assistant and I did not have time to answer, but it was a thrill to see their excitement about the future!
-Dr. B.
Work With Kinematic Diagrams
