Science Olympiad 2014 Building Events

Building Events

Boomilever  A Boomilever is a cantilevered wood and adhesive structure, mounted to a vertical testing wall, carrying a load at a distance from the wall. The objective of this event is to design and build the most efficient Boomilever meeting the requirements specified in the rules for this event (to be discussed in detail at the club meeting)  Each team is allowed to enter one Boomilever built prior to the competition.  At the competition, the event supervisor will provide all assessment devices, testing apparatus, hardware, level, two bucket stabilization sticks, and clean, dry sand or similar dry free-flowing material.

Boomilever

Rotor Egg Drop  A team of 2 students will construct an unpowered, autorotation helicopter device, which uses one or more helicopter rotor(s) to safely transport a raw chicken egg from a specified height to the floor.  Students will need to bring one prebuilt helicopter egg drop device.  The device must use wings or blades that rotate around a central axis to slow the descent of the egg, using aerodynamic principles of a helicopter rotor in unpowered “autorotation” mode. No energy-producing mechanism of any type may be used to power the rotor(s) to slow the descent of the device.

Rotor Egg Drop

Simple Machines  This event has two parts: Part1 – written test on simple machines Part2 – device testing Students will need to bring a single pre-made device, tools, supplies, reference materials, calculators. The objective is to quickly determine an unknown mass using a known mass and a lever. Written test will include questions about simple machine concepts, simple machine calculations (e.g., ideal/actual mechanical advantage, efficiency, load, effort), simple machine history (e.g., Greek/Renaissance discoveries) and static equilibrium simple machines (lever, inclined plane, wedge, pulley, wheel & axle)

Simple Machines

Sounds of Music  Each team must build two instruments (of any two of the following three types: percussion, strings, winds), based on a 12 tone tempered scale, prepare to describe principles behind their operation and be able to perform a major scale, required and chosen melody with each.  Teams must provide a score of all music (both chosen and required) to be performed and submit it in notated form at the beginning to their presentation.  All music must be written in the appropriate clef for each of the instruments (#1: Treble, #2: Bass)  Each competitor must play at least one instrument

Sounds of Music

Wheeled Vehicle  Competitors must design, build, and test one vehicle that uses a non- metallic, elastic material as its sole means of propulsion to travel a distance as quickly and accurately as possible.  Vehicles must be designed as a single integral device to travel a distance between 7.00 m and m and come to a complete stop without straying from the track’s center.  All energy used to propel the vehicle must be stored in a non- metallic elastic device. Pre-loaded energy storage devices may be used to operate other vehicle functions (e.g., braking system) as long as they do not provide energy to propel the vehicle.  The distance between the center of rotation of the front-most and rear-most axles must not be > 70 cm. The entire vehicle width must not exceed 30 cm at any point.

Wheeled Vehicle

Hands-On Events

Write-It Do-It  One student will write a description of an object and how to build it, and then the other student will attempt to construct the object from this description.  A student is shown an object, which may be abstract and is the same for all teams. The student has 25 minutes to write a description of the object and how to build it. Only numerals, words and single letters may be used. No symbols, drawings and diagrams are allowed.  The event supervisor will pass the description to the remaining team member who will take the description and attempt to recreate(build) the original object in 20 minutes.

Write-It Do-It

Mystery Architecture  At the beginning of the event, teams will be given a bag of building materials and instructions for designing and building a device that can be tested.  Each team will be given a bag containing the same materials. Examples of materials are: paper cups, drinking straws, paper clips, string, tape, paper, thumbtacks, and Popsicle sticks. Materials are not limited to this list. The actual materials provided may be entirely different. Only those materials contained in the bag may be used to build the structure.  The instructions will identify a Primary Dimension, a Secondary Dimension and whether the device must support a load (and for how long).  The team of students will have a maximum of 40 min. to construct the specified device

Mystery Architecture  Some examples of devices and Primary Dimensions are: The tallest tower to hold a baseball at the top, the longest bridge to hold a small milk carton full of sand in the center, the longest cantilever to hold a chalkboard eraser at the end, or the shortest boat/barge to float holding a baseball without sinking. Devices are not limited to these examples. Secondary Dimension examples: width of tower base or width of bridge or cantilever. The students will not know the assignment until they begin the competition.

Mystery Architecture

Experimental Design  This event will determine a team’s ability to design, conduct, and report the findings of an experiment actually conducted on site.  The event supervisor will assign a question/topic area that determines the nature of the experiment. The assigned question/topic will be same for all teams and allow students to conduct experiments involving relationships between independent and dependant variables (like height vs. distance).  When the teams are finished, the final report should include - statement of the problem, hypothesis, variables, experimental control, materials, procedure, qualitative observations during experiment and summary of results, quantitative data, statistics (mean, median, mode, range), analysis of results, conclusion and recommendations.

Experimental Design