Coaster Car- Prototyping!

Recently, we've completed our coaster cars in Engineering Class. We completed four different prototypes in order to find the most stable coaster car, with the largest velocity. Although it may not seem like much, prototyping is a lot of work and must be precise. It is a huge part of the designing process, seeing as you must find the best model that completes the objective. The objective of our design was to roll down the ramp successfully in a straight line, traveling as far as possible. This meant we had to rearrange our car in various ways in order to discover which one would be the best.

Our original car was designed to be simple yet effective. We decided to use styrofoam as the chassis of our coaster car because according to Newtons law of gravity, the smaller the mass, the larger the acceleration. We used rubber hubs, 3/16 wooden axles, and straws as the bearings. We placed two wheels on each side of the car and two in the middle. We began prototyping by assigning a task to each member of our group. I, maintained traffic, assuring no one was in the way of our coaster car, enabling it to roll down the ramp freely. Gulsanam, another member in my group, dropped the coaster car down the ramp while Tanzim collected data. Next, we'd place the coaster car on the string, located in the middle of the ramp. The rear of the car would be on the very top of the ramp and it'd then be released, afterwards as the car stopped somewhere along the bottom of the ramp, we'd measure the distance the car traveled. We'd preform this three times for each prototype.

Eventually, we ended up constructing four different cars and ended up with a coaster car that was much wider than the original and on each side of the axles were two wheels, therefore we ended up having 8 wheels on our final design. We felt that having more wheels would stabilize the car and keep it from roaming off the track. This ended up being the best design, seeing as our car stayed on track and rolled the farthest out of our previous prototypes.

Through our four different prototypes we were able to enhance, rearrange, and repair our coaster car. I feel as though personally this project opened up a whole new "light" of engineering. I was able to actually experience how difficult the designing process is and the significance of brainstorming and prototyping. Engineering is a massive part of our everyday life and tools, it is far more simply said than done. It takes a lot more time and effort than I had originally thought. Overall, I feel our group did a good job prototyping and I believe this project was a success.