0510: "Egg Drop Failure"

[AWA]

Comic:

Link

Alt-text: I hear my brother Ricky won his school's egg drop by leaving the egg inside the hen.

Commentary: Ah, memories. I loved the old egg drop. I failed the test, but passed the course.


This is my first discussion thread! Hope it lives!

Edit: Oops, forgot the link! Thanks, TheHand!

Double edit (in the form of anecdote, so as to not clutter up the thread): My egg drop came in 7th grade. We were given a set amount of materials (can't remember what they were, incidentally; I think they included a wood block, rubber bands, cardstock paper, and string) and told to built a car that would protect an egg if crashed into a brick or something. Mine was rather convoluted: I remember trying to apply force dispersion as well as all of the normal "padding" tricks. It failed anyway. >.> I took it home and ritually burned it, because it had failed me.

[TheHand]

Awwwwwwww so cute

Oh wait, but you need a link to the comic.

[GodShapedBullet]

This is a pretty adorable one.

[suso]

Leaving the egg in the hen. Now that's genius. This comic really brings back the memories. Mine should have been able to make it from 30 feet, had my science teacher (who is in a family of egg cartoners ironically (Creighton Bros.)) had dropped it right.

[Elipongo]

Boy, that chick learned to fly pretty fast!

[hthall]

Kind of like the stone that never hits the ground. I always liked the five-pounds-of-overthick-gelatin approach, myself.

[ysth]

I think Ricky was channeling Bug-Eyed Earl.
Or Randall was. Or something.

Is it cheating to leave off the "" around the comic name in the thread title to post it more quickly?

[Sgeo]

In 6th grade, my class apparently knocked some toy of another class out the window, which was used to start a war between the classes. There was a trial, and I was put on as a witness. I wasn't paying attention when the event happened, so I said that I didn't know. "Why are you up here?" I didn't have a response, but someone else said "Because you called him up"

Anyway, I realized after the "trial" that it was staged, because there were "jurors" from our class and the same number in theirs, and apparently a tie meant that we (the defendents) one. Another classmate later revealed that there was a schedule of events, with listed winners..

So yeah, that's my vaguely-not-really-related-to-eggdrop-story..

[Fuzzy OneThree]

Thanks for reminding me that my group's project was the only one not to survive the fall in my physics class, Randall.

[BlueNight]

When I was chosen to participate, my dad had me make an inch-thick foam-rubber egg case. It worked flawlessly.

[GodShapedBullet]

In 6th grade, my class apparently knocked some toy of another class out the window, which was used to start a war between the classes. There was a trial, and I was put on as a witness. I wasn't paying attention when the event happened, so I said that I didn't know. "Why are you up here?" I didn't have a response, but someone else said "Because you called him up"

Anyway, I realized after the "trial" that it was staged, because there were "jurors" from our class and the same number in theirs, and apparently a tie meant that we (the defendents) one. Another classmate later revealed that there was a schedule of events, with listed winners..

So yeah, that's my vaguely-not-really-related-to-eggdrop-story..

Oh man, that's so totally not related to the egg drop story at all.

But it's a good story though.

[xkdvd]

Did an egg drop in 8th grade (last year). I used a suspension system - two tubular nets (cut from stockings) perpendicular to each other, attached to the inside of the box, with a hole cut in one of them so that the other can pass through it in the middle of the box. The egg was placed in the intersection point, with a knot tied in the nets to secure it there. Worked perfectly.

[Steve the Pocket]

Ours was an egg launch, in which distance and height counted or something. AND we had to pack it in a container that would keep it from breaking.

I seem to recall mine didn't break, not surprising given that we weren't confined to specific materials and my dad happened to have a ton of packing materials lying around. I don't remember how the launcher (a first-class lever made out of a log and a plank) performed.

[GIR]

Boy, that chick learned to fly pretty fast!

It's spent a lot of time in a science class. It may be the Einstein among fowl!

[sargeras0000]

I remember an egg drop I did in 7th Grade. Mine fell apart because, although we had a month to make the carrier, we had to take it apart and put an egg in right before the drop. They told this to us right before the drop.

[GodShapedBullet]

What did you expect, sargeras0000?

[sand]

I always liked the five-pounds-of-overthick-gelatin approach, myself.

Not as cool as the non-newtonian fluid method

http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=KYSlK4f94p0

[Fat Tony]

I won the egg drop in fifth grade by taking a huge lump of clay, cutting it in having, gouging a hole in the middle with a spoon, placing the egg inside, and mushing the clay back together.
Not only was it unscratched, but it made the loudest thump out of all of them!

[von Eisenstein]

Ironically, I started compiling a list of solutions to the egg drop last week. =D Unfortunately, "parachute" and "bubble wrap" failed to make it because they were too ordinary.
My favorite so far is "Place the egg in a cave containing dripping mineral water. Wait 100 million years*. Drop the crystal-encased egg." Gotta post that list somewhere in the Science forum someday. ^_^;;

(*I see two scenarios, neither of which would void the "breaking" clause. a) The inside of the egg is quickly replaced by mineral water before it manages to go bad, b)The egg rots, but because it is undisturbed it rots without breaking the shell.)

[masher]

I did an egg drop in highschool; it failed.

Also, does anyone know how to view the alt text on an itouch?

[suzi]

The egg drop in my high school was restricted to paper and scotch tape, and you got more points the lighter it was. I didn't take physics, but a friend made (I think) the best one in class...a simple cone shape with frayed edges, and strips of paper packed down the front of the cone. I think it was only three or four pieces of paper all told, and it hovered down very very slowly out of the 3rd story window and gracefully crumpled on the sidewalk, both eggs completely intact. It was fantastic.

[limerick]

Hmn, I wonder what that design is that he used? We have an egg-drop later in the year for Physics and I've been thinking about how to do it for ages, ha.

A friend of mine placed his egg in the center of a liter of jell-o.
My brother put his in the middle of a giant stuffed bear.

What to do, what to do ..?


Also; this person, I guess, would fail, seeing as the egg shell broke.
But no yoke spilled out! So they must have succeeded!
Oh no!

[Nemphael]

We never did egg drops in school. This saddens me. I'm not doing physics, though - electronics/computer science.

There was a cop at our school one time. He brought eggs and preached about using helmets. He gave me the impression one should always * use a helmet. It did save one of the eggs.

By the way, I think Mythbusters should do this one: "Will falling out of a plane in a bag of newtonian fluid save your life?". I say it will - disprove it.

*I don't, though. Does this put me at risk? (*Waits for this to develop into a discussion about monitor resolution*)

[Joeldi]

Am I the only one for whom only the bottom half of the comic won't show? It didn't show in this thread or on the actual site..

[almightyze]

I'm sorry, but that was cute.

[saraid]

I did the egg drop in 8th grade. Well, I didn't really do it. We were given a single piece of paper and we could do whatever we wanted with it. Had to survive ten feet. The entire class made up all these elaborate designs (you know where this is going, right?) and well... I wasn't interested. So I rolled mine up into a cone, dropped the egg inside, and handed it off.

It worked. I don't remember whether or not it fell over.

[Deviant]

This comic got me thinking, its been a long time since I've done any elementary physics but what if you placed the egg in a large coke bottle, and then filled it up with water and dropped it off. Aslong as you kept the egg away from the sides, then the impact would have nearly no effect on the egg wouldn't it ?

I think I know what I'm doing with my weekend !

[Unforgiven]

So I gather from this thread an "egg drop" is some sort of contest at school where you have to design a contraption to safely drop an egg from some height?

Because this is the first I've ever heard of it.

[Ferahgo]

My egg drop was in fifth grade... mine failed miserably also, though not for as entertaining a reason.

[hagger]

So I gather from this thread an "egg drop" is some sort of contest at school where you have to design a contraption to safely drop an egg from some height?

Because this is the first I've ever heard of it.

I too have never heard of one of these. I assume it's an American thing? We did bottle rockets and a parachute, but no egg drops.

We did an egg and spoon race, which was Uber. Ah, sweet memories.

[RJFerret]

Mine was 7th grade, multiple drops as the teacher moved higher up a ladder, weight mattered but we weren't supplied materials.

The packing peanuts and parachutes did best IF the teacher dropped the chutes kindly. I've wondered since if a packing peanut payload WITH a chute would have won.

Of course, as an adult I would use a few helium balloons to have the lightest, if ungainly win.

[SirEel]

What would happen if you attatched enough helium balloons that the egg did not fall? is that a win, a fail, or the most win fail ever?

[Aralonia]

I remember doing this in 5th grade, very, very fondly. I took a plastic container and lined the sides with a foam cushion (similar to memory foam, but grey and far less malleable - I think an analogue would be something that you'd use for air shipping of sensitive materials), then tied that in between two massive 70cm-diameter by 25cm height wheels made out of the same foam cushion. Instead of using some common rope or whatever to tie the things together, though, my dad came up with the idea to use old windshield wiper blades to fasten everything together. The payload would sit inside the plastic container, inside the foam cushion.

On the big day, dropping the thing off the side of a handy 35-foot tower at my school, mine went first, landed, and bounced. I was proud of the fact it resembled what I thought the Mars Pathfinder looked like upon landing.

Since the thing landed on its side, it presented a nice 70cm wide target for the other students to try and hit. Fools.

...Now I want to rebuild this thing.

[Aspergia]

Instead of any normal sort of egg drop, our school had us build a model bridge which had to span a foot-wide gap between two desks and support a carton of eggs. We could only use sticky tape, sewing cotton and plastic drinking straws.

We worked hard. We went to the library and everything (this is what people did before Wikipedia, remember? ) and came up with some complicated interpretation of the suspension bridge which, suffice to say, failed pretty miserably. We didn't think to use about a dozen strands of cotton wound together, rather than just one.

The winnering team just got about a zillion straws ten minutes before the test and wrapped sticky tape around them until they had basically a plastic 4x2 plank. So much for ingenuity.

[ysth]

So I gather from this thread an "egg drop" is some sort of contest at school where you have to design a contraption to safely drop an egg from some height?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Egg_drop_competition

[Alder]

Because this is the first I've ever heard of it.

I too have never heard of one of these. I assume it's an American thing? We did bottle rockets and a parachute, but no egg drops.

Haven't heard of it either. Sounds like fun, though...

[alexjhh]

Might hold one of these as a charity fundraiser at my uni - I'll get a lecturer to judge.

Now to look up a rules list - there's quite a few around.

Tempted to ban non-newtonian fluids though, just so I get the joy of announcing that particular rule in a lecture theatre in front of 300 people.

[davebrown42]

This comic got me thinking, its been a long time since I've done any elementary physics but what if you placed the egg in a large coke bottle, and then filled it up with water and dropped it off. Aslong as you kept the egg away from the sides, then the impact would have nearly no effect on the egg wouldn't it ?

This is exactly what I did for the egg drop competition in my 5th grade class, except I used a gallon milk jug with the top cut off (so the egg would fit) and filled it with saltwater. The teachers argued at length about whether my entry was acceptable (although there were no limits on materials, everyone else made complex contraptions of foam, rubber bands, etc). Eventually they relented and dropped it; it was spectacular. The milk jug pretty much exploded like a water balloon on impact, and the first two rows of spectators got wet. Unfortunately I got screwed: the egg survived, but an angry teacher quickly picked it up, declared it had a "hairline crack", and threw it in the trash. I later heard her arguing with another teacher that I couldn't have been allowed to win as it was "cheating" and violated the "principle of the event". The next year, liquids were specifically banned, which I took as a validation of my victory.

[Fratboy]

Unfortunately, we never seem to be allowed to use rocket fuel for all these egg drop projects...
oh well

[mache-b123]

Ahahaha, I remember my own egg drop contest.

Mine was truly simple: a 10 oz soup plate from polystyrene (which was left from a party a couple of days before), full of jelly and the egg right there. And just in case, a parachute from a Carrefour plastic bag.

Of course, I won. Even when half the jelly was thrown down when a subit crosswind made my "jelly and egg saucer" unstable. But... as the quickest survivor, I won.