October 28, 2004
A: FROM MENTOR KRIS MOODY IN NH
When I was in college at Brown University, there was a similar contest
every year in the Engineering Department. The contest was to build a
bridge out of balsa wood. Some of my friends competed one year, but their
bridge didn't do very well. However, the contest was fun and it was neat
to see all the different designs. I just did a quick search on the web and
found a site that has tons of information about building balsa wood
bridges. www.balsabridge.com The physics would be similar for building
any structure. Maybe you can poke around this site and think about how to
translate bridge building to tower building. The test for the tower is to
see how large a load it can support, and the test for a bridge is to see
how much load can be suspended from it. Both of those loads are creating a
force on the structure in the same direction, whether the force is from
above or from below. What I think is different between these two contests
is the objective of the tower to maximize its height. I think looking at
truss designs will be the key. But please consider that you are getting
this advice from me, an electrical engineer! This is definitely not my
area of expertise. However, what is cool about engineering and physics is
that, whether you're talking about electrical, thermal, fluids, mechanics,
or so many other areas of engineering, there is a lot of stuff that is
common to all these areas. The rules are just applied in a different
framework. Good luck!