Weekly Post (week 7)

1. What you did in the prior week
In the last week, I helped to load the 24” bridge during the test. It was an exciting experience to help “destroying” the bridge. I also helped to analysis the collapse of the bridge and try to reinforce the weakest point.

2. What you and your teammates have agreed you'll do in the coming week
In the future weeks, the length of the bridge will expand form 24” to 36”. We will keep the structure design of the bridge due to its outstanding performance. Truss analysis,A-3, would be conducted in the next week. The nature of the forces would be found out. Some small adjusting could be applied.

3. Major accomplishments of the week for the team
Our bridge did fantastic job during the second test. We added two pieces into the bridge compare to the original one. At the same time, the maximum load of the bridge increased from 29 lbs to 47lbs. It was a really big improvement. It proved that the design of the bridge is outstanding. We did not place the first position according to the spreadsheet which recoded the first time result. But the result of the second test was competitive.

4. Issues that the team or you as an individual faces
It is hard to predict the result of the bridge when it expend to 36”. A main flaw of the bridge is that it lacks enough room for the future adjustment. It is strong and compact. However, it also means that the bridge lack the room for the improvement. As individual, I have started to worry about writing the final report of the bridge.

5. Up to now the software you've used (WPBD) has provided "block box" answers, but you haven't really had any numbers associated with the Knex project. What numbers would you like to know for your Knex designs? If you have ideas about how to calculate them please give them.
After the testing of the bridge, the WPBD will give detail data about the compression and tension force work on chords. Further adjustments of the design could be made according to these numbers. However, for the Knex project, it would not automatically give the report as the WPBD. We could analysis the triangle by calculating the number of lengths and angles. Detail cacluation method could be found at the following website: http://www.jhu.edu/~virtlab/bridge/truss.htm. And an Excel spreadsheet has also been set up for the convenient reason. https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B69AvRYJR07tdUFUV1EteUZmdFk/edit
Throughout the calculation, we can find out the weakest chords in the bridge and reinforce them.