Educational Rube Goldberg MachineTeam: P13731

Project Summary

Design Development

Kyle Schmitz, John Rizzo, James ParksDan Spiers, Maddie Burke

Fundamentals

System Design

Theme Integration

Assembly

The goal is to develop a automatically resettable Rube Goldberg Machine to

educate viewers about the fundamental concepts of engineering. The display will also demonstrate the capabilities of Multidisciplinary Senior Design and raise awareness about the

program.

Arduino Control

This Rube Goldberg Machine uses an Arduino Due microcontroller

board. With 54 inputs and outputs and a 32 bit ARM core processor, the Arduino is great for this application. The limit switches are activated, and

the Arduino is programmed to process that information.

The entire system is set up to maximize viewing area. Users can stand around the machine and look at different sections. In front of each section there is a description of the engineering fundamentals being demonstrated. The ball rolls around the table through different subsystems in a counter clockwise direction.

P13731 Page

The team chose fundamental concepts from multiple engineering disciplines to be displayed in the Rube Goldberg machine. • Springs• Magnets• Circuits• Robotics• Programming• Kaizen method• Counterweight • LEDs• Fluid flow• Aerodynamics• Projectile motion• Conduction• Energy conversion

apply

1st year

2nd year co-op

graduation

senior year

3rd year

The team brainstormed ways to visually demonstrate the chosen

engineering concepts while integrating the theme of the

machine. Sketches, discussions, and detailed designs were

exchanged in order to chose the current systems. Some 3D models of the entire system and the robot

were created in CAD.

Rube Goldberg machines often have an overall theme of the contraption. The theme of this machine is college. The user starts by “applying” to college and releasing the ball. In the next section the robot represents a freshman student navigating the RIT campus. Second year is full studying and tests, shown by a Kaizen demonstration with the marbles as the knowledge being learned. Co-op opportunities fly students across the country to different jobs. Upper classmen demonstrate projectile motion with a fun college game. Senior year is full of balancing school and activities. In the last subsystem, the student has graduated and moves on to job land.

Rube Goldberg Machines

A Rube Goldberg Machine is a device, contraption or invention that

is intentionally over-engineered or exaggerated to perform a simple task in a complicated fashion, usually in a

chain reaction. The name is based off of the American cartoonist Rube

Goldberg who used to draw similar machines.

Arduino

IndustrialMechanicalElectricalComputer

Assembly of any Rube Goldberg Machine involves a lot of testing and alterations along the way. In order to make the systems work continuously the group is constantly making small changes and improvements in each

subsystem. One of the main challenges for this project is making the entire machine automatically resettable.