TOOTHPICK SPAN
The purpose of this project was to create a span made of toothpicks with the span of 15cm. In this project, we constructed a pre-designed bridge span and measured the load it can carry. We modified your pre-designed bridge span by adding a maximum of 6 more toothpicks and measured the load that structure can carry.
My partner Elizaveta and I constructed our first design (for a visual view, see the pictures from above). It spaned for over 15cm and the toothpicks were only held together with craft glue.
For our second trial, we added 6 more toothpicks on the sides to add support to be able to hold more weight. We kept everything else the same.
In the second trial, the structure held more weight. The structure held 571.5g in the first trial, then it was able to hold 671.8g in the second trial. There wasn't a significant improvement. The first design twisted under the heavy weight, and on the second trial, the center part of the structure cracked.
From the structural design, I noticed that there was a big gap between most toothpicks. So next time, I would use more toothpicks to close those gaps in between for more support and stability.
The second design was different from the first design because at the ends of the structure the toothpicks were diagonal. On the first trial, the structure held 669.8g and on the second trial the structure held 966.6g. We didn't add any extra toothpicks onto the second trial of the second design. On the frist trial, we cut of the extra overlap, and on the second design, we didnt cut of the overlap.
Out of all the 4 trials that we tried, the second design's second trial held the most weight, it almost held 1 full kilogram. So I think that was the best trial.
Next time when I'm doing this project again, I would take more time building the structures more carefully.
