Cranberry Slicer - Thanksgiving Break Camp - Day 2

Yesterday we smashed our cranberries. Today we wanted to slice our sauce! Days 2 and 3 are interesting because we have some brand new tinkerers and some that attended previous days.

After tool training we get down to some serious designing. Today we had Cranberry Death Sled, Elevator, and Simple Machine teams!

During the planning session the Elevator team decided it should use the up and down motion to power a Conveyor Belt.  It seemed like a lot for one day, but we were confident and wanted to go for it!

After some fun at the park and lunch the teams refocus and get down to business - we only have 2 hours to make everything work!  Today the tinkerers did a lot of independent problem solving.  The youngest were able to take design plans and recreate the objects in real life. The older ones took on tricky problems like how to secure the slicing knife to the track and how to hold the Death Sled at the top of the ramp until the right moment. 

At the end of the day we had arranged the contraptions and tested them in ones and pairs, but not all together.  It was time for a dry run - the best way to see what needs to get tweaked where.

Cranberry Slicer Dry FAIL from Tinkering School on Vimeo.

After our dry run each contraption that needed adjustmenting received them from tinkerers overflowing with excitement. We then reset the whole machine and then loaded the Cranberry Sauce.

Cranberry Slicer Wet Run from Tinkering School on Vimeo.

Once again, our machine almost worked perfectly! Each amazing contraption functioned, just not all together! We also totally sent a cranberry cylinder to its death on a tiny sled.