Innovative Toilet Seat Closure using Mousetrap Mechanics
Our project aimed to create a contraption that automatically closes a toilet seat using simple materials found around the house. The design features a ramp that releases a golf ball onto a mousetrap, which, when triggered, pulls a string attached to the toilet seat. The project showcases various energy conversions, including gravitational potential energy to kinetic energy and spring potential energy to rotational kinetic energy. After 5 hours of construction, we learned valuable lessons in mechanics and teamwork, overcoming challenges in design and assembly.
Innovative Toilet Seat Closure using Mousetrap Mechanics
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Presentation Transcript
Flushed!!! By: Vincent McCoy Kathy Erickson Josh Debity Rich Adams
Introduction • Our project’s goal was to make a contraption that closed a toilet seat. • Our parts were mostly found around the house. We purchased a large mousetrap that cost roughly 3 dollars. • Other expenses were the cost of wood to build the base and a few screws.
Overview • Our first step is to release a golf ball down a ramp. Then it lands on a mousetrap. Attached to the arm of the mousetrap is a long stick of wood. • There is a piece of string attached to the piece of wood. The string is attached to a toilet seat at the opposite end of the project. When the trap is set off, it lowers the toilet seat.
Energy Conversions • Ball • Gravitational Potential Energy to Kinetic Energy • Mousetrap • Spring Potential Energy to Rotational Kinetic Energy • Toilet Seat • Gravitational Potential Energy to Kinetic Energy
Conclusions • The building of the project took 5 hours of work by all four team members. Much more time was used in planning and reports. • We encountered some problems including: • Construction of the mousetrap to work with the pole on it • Repositioning the string to enable us to mount the toilet seat. • We are glad to get EF out of our systems!!!
