Austin Key and Jacob Stephens

Overview

Our goal was to create a bridge that would hold considerable weight while remaining efficient.  The bridge had to be 12” long, 4” wide, and 1.5” tall.  Instead of rebar we used 2 welding wires twisted together.  Once the mold for the bridge was created, we would mix concrete, pour, then test the bridges using the structural stress analyzer, after a couple days of drying.

 

In creating our bridge, Austin and I followed the 12-step engineering model; beginning with brainstorming.  We threw a bunch of ideas and sketches down onto paper, and then we researched real reinforced concrete bridges.  This allowed us to make a confident choice of which brainstorm to pursue bringing to life.  We refined our design and noted the measurements.  Then Austin assembled the wooden box our bridge would dry in while I formed our foam molds.  Our bridge unfortunately broke while we were removing it from the mold, as did many other groups’ bridges because we were using expired concrete.  We never got to test the strength of our bridge.