The object the Rube Goldberg machine was to crack an egg in at least five steps, ending up with more than half the egg and less than half the shell in the final container. As can be seen in the video, we managed to get most of the egg and no shell at all!
A collaboration with Paul Rothman and Steven Litt.
The steps
A marble rolls down a spiraling track, which then hits a LEGO turnstyle, which pulls a brake from under a LEGO cart’s wheel, which then rolls down a slanted board. The cart has a lit candle on the front, which burns a string holding down the spring on a toaster. The toaster then shoots another LEGO piece onto a mouse trap, which pulls away a stick of wood that is holding up a guillotine. The guillotine then flies down and through the egg, slicing it perfectly in half. A channel under the structure holding the egg directs all the yolk into the final container.
Iterations
Our original idea for the final step was to have a Dremel tool slice off the tip of the egg. The Dremel would be on from the beginning and would gradually move down towards the egg. This was done by balancing it on a pulley with a bucket of sand. The bucket had a hole at the bottom, which was blocked with a piece of cloth. The cloth would get pulled out when the mouse trap got triggered. This only worked a few times because the Dremel had to be lowered very slowly or else it would slip off the egg. When it did work, the shaft of the cutting tool would get caught in the egg causing the Dremel to slip off to one side. Also, this method resulted in a mist of egg yolk being sprayed all over the place, which was sort of disgusting.
We then proceeded with the guillotine idea, but now needed it to be lowered as fast as possible. We tried keeping the bucket of sand and using magnets connected to twine to break it off the pulley, but that was too unreliable. We finally opted for the support wooden stick solution, which worked every time.
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