Today was judgment day! For 1.013 Senior Design, one of our major projects is to design a bridge for a third world country in a savannah climate during the flood season. The bridge had to span 10 ft, and the deck had be at least 2 feet above the ground. The failure criteria was that the bridge had to hold 2000lbs of weight, and not deflect more than 1/2 inch.
We decided to use wood since that is a readily available material in the third world, and to do a spin on the classic truss structure. We wanted the design to be visually appealing, so our side trusses formed a V shape. and the planks laid across the top of the bridge.
Our Bridge in SketchUp!
The underneath V of the bridge. So visually appealing!
It was a beautiful day outside, perfect for bridge testing! There were a whole variety of bridges – arches, a roll-up bridge, and other ones I don’t even know how to describe. It was finally our turn to load our bridge, but as the only all-female group all 5’4’’' or shorter, we were struggling a little bit to raise the 50lb blocks up 3ft in the air. Suddenly all these male onlookers swooped in and loaded our bridge in less than a minute. It didn’t fail, and it passed the deflection test by deflecting only 3/8’’! Most groups don’t pass the deflection requirement since its meant for a highway overpass, so we were proud of our design.
The bridge in the midst of being loaded with 2000lbs!
Beautiful Day!
Confident in our design to load another few hundred pounds on it.
Yay! Our hard-work on our bridge paid off!
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