Learn . Create . Succeed

Being Proactive for Education

2008-06-09T23:01:05-04:00

Science Technology Engineering Mathematics and of course SolidWorks, the language of idea transferrence.

This will be a talk about what the Clark County School District is doing in Las Vegas, Nevada, to bring about some exceptionally trained students for the future of our country and the world and just maybe beyond it. Double click on the link below to get an idea about how we are trying to contribute to the technological need of our country.

Download studentssciences_subjects_schools_and_teachers_6_3_08.doc

Some Good Tips and WebSites for Teachers

2008-06-04T01:28:27-04:00

Teacher Resources and SolidWorks; Unbeatable.

By Richard Williams 5/30/08

There hasn’t always been a platform like this to let others know about some very useful things that could help them in their various educational jobs. The SolidWorks company gives a few of us the chance to tell you about some nice informational resources that can assist teachers around the world. In this article I will make the ones I like and have found known to you. There are many of these web sites that are out there and it is impossible to list or even find them all but I would like to share with you those that I find notable.

I have noticed a trend in the last few years with web masters or site owners that give away some pretty neat things in order to attract visitors to their sites. The URL’s or web addresses of these sites can spread more quickly than a brush fire these days and indeed it is a good way to get teachers to come to your site. I would like to make a declaration here to you right now so that you know that I do not get rewarded financially about telling you about these sites. The intention of this article is to make you aware of their existence and it is up to you the teacher to make the judgment about traveling to the site, buying anything or downloading any free programs and or information. I will say to you that I trust these web page sites and believe them to be run properly and worthwhile for you to check out. Just one more thought here. Many of the teachers out there most likely know about these sites or have your own but there are new young teachers coming into this profession each year and might not know about them. Double click on link below to open up the document I have prepared for you. Have a great day.

Download teacher_sites_addendum_to_5_30_08.doc

The Pasta Saga Ends on a good note.

2008-05-21T23:16:46-04:00

Making Pasta History the SolidWorks Way

By Richard Williams 5/22/2008

Moving right along these days in the world of Static Stress Testing of Pasta, leaves me gaining on the information I need to provide to a couple of university professors that are interested in my work. I know that I am making historic gains here simply because no one else (in their right mind) would do it this way and that puts me into a totally new class of junior scientists that have white robes on, with arm strings tied around the backside. We testing scientists of this caliber also can test things without proper testing equipment. Our laboratories have nice padded walls and if anything does go wrong we are shielded from harm. Wow! What nice working conditions. None of this is true of course because my garage gets turned into my testing lab pumpkin as soon as my son leaves for work and my “honey do list” gets done. Then I turn into that mad scientist with pencil, pad and ruler. The setting up for the test is not the hardest part of doing this. What actually is the hardest part is finding out a basal level or starting point stress, to start the test at. Pasta itself is not always consistent when manufactured and there are some slight variations and sometimes big differences in the strength of the material when being tested. Because of the various tests that had to be done, I realized that one procedure was not going to fit the Chef’s menu for all things being tested for. Right out of the three boxes of Barilla Fettuccini Pasta, I noticed some problems. First look for a box that was not dropped, crushed or mishandled and this is how you find out. There is a little cellophane window in the front that will reveal if the pasta is all broken up. Alternate the ends of the box up in the air and if you see a lot of pieces go sliding by tell the person watching you do this in the store, that you are looking for bugs and that you are a bug inspector. Or tell them the truth about what you are going to do with it and they might call those special people in those nice white suits. One supermarket checkout lady asked me if I needed any sauce to go with the Fettuccini and she was still laughing after I told her what it was going to be used for when I left with my change. Some people.

When I first started testing this pasta I was doing a static stress test on an 8” I-beam so it was a straight down type of force and it really held up remarkably well. Something that only weighs in at 4 grams and that supported a really heavy weight of: (Figures taken out of a previous article submission.)

Summary for I-beam test will be considered at an average of the five test beams and it calculates to be = 771.20 grams or 0.7712 kilograms or 27.2033 oz., or 1.7002 lbs., for this part of the testing of the bridge components. Remarkable.

When you think about this for a minute and take the four gram weight of the I-beam (less than the weight of a lot of ball point pens) and divide it into the 771.20 grams of averaged weight that it supported, it means that this component of my bridge can support 192.8 times its own weight, rounded off to the nearest tenth. To put it another way, this little 4 gram weighted I-beam configuration can support a truly amazing 1.7002 lbs. This is indeed a remarkable strength factor exhibited by Fettuccini Pasta when assembled into an I-beam shape.

Well the Bridge is built, the testing is done, the findings submitted to the world and only one thing is left to do. It now needs to be tested or rescued from destructive testing. Many people have asked me to forgo the testing because once destroyed it cannot serve as an inspiration to others. An art teacher I know said, “what good would destroying it do?” Can’t it be done virtually or by computer analysis? She is a retired art teacher yet she knows about this kind of testing? I find that to be as remarkable as my test results. She is a great lady and I’m learning many things from her. But contrarily, statements from some engineers and others say, “it needs to be tested to prove certain pasta testing strength data.” Now let me tell you what happened today. The Mechanical Engineering Department at UNLV or the University of Las Vegas wants my bridge. They want to display it in the Great Hall. I have no idea where that is or even what it means. The only experience I have had with universities is when I was building them. Truly, it is a perplexing problem to solve and I do not have any experience here to deal with it. However, there are a few UNLV professors that would rather put it on display and since they did encourage me to finish up this project I must let them have it. So it will not be subjected to destructive testing but donated to the Good Professors and the Mechanical Engineering Department there. This will be the final chapter in this ongoing saga of “Building with Pasta” series. I sincerely hope that somewhere, somehow, at sometime, someone was or will be informed by it, or made to laugh at it, or possibly be surprised by the findings in it and or just be entertained by all of it. Sincerely,

Amazing Pasta Testing Results.

2008-05-19T01:02:52-04:00

Raw Barilla Fettuccini Pasta is Surprisingly Strong

By Richard Williams; 5/19/2008

This latest article report would be the sort of thing that would make a lot of money here in Las Vegas, if it were used to bet upon the test results, by the legal gambling institutions here. I know I would have lost money if I had bet on how much a strut of Fettuccini Pasta with dimensions of 3/16” inch wide (4.7625mm), by .06 of an inch thick (1.5240mm), by 8” long (20.32cm) would support in stress weight tests. It is even more surprisingly so when made into an I-Beam shape like those used in buildings we see going up around the world. Remember, this is the same pasta that you cook and eat. Right out of the box it measures 10” inches long but I trimmed it back to eight inches to get better sections with straight ends that I cut myself. I performed these tests over the last week and I think you will be tremendously surprised about the data that I was able to gather and provide to you. Truly some tests had amazing results. My data is also not the definitive answer here for the results of all brands of pasta, just the Barilla Fettuccini type. I am also including another PDF report that was done in three different universities in South America. They used a round pasta and Fettuccini is a slightly oval configuration. I was able to make I-Beams out of Fettuccini Pasta to build my bridge but I don’t think it would be possible to do it with the round type. I’m also going to list once again those pasta bridge building web sites for you. Do enjoy the data and descriptive procedure with pictures and do please consider this much less expensive material than the balsa woods that many of you teachers out there use. In truth that is why I did this project to begin with, to give you a much cheaper alternative. This would not be suggested for the lower grade levels but could be incorporated in 7^th grades on up to college grades. It also would not have to be this elaborate either. Enjoy. (copy and paste links if they do not link up to web site automatically)

http://civil.camosun.bc.ca/spaghetti_bridge/2008Pics/content/Skills_Canada_2008_SB_032_large.html
http://www.researchchannel.org/prog/displayevent.aspx?rID=4070
http://civil.camosun.bc.ca/spaghetti_bridge/Index.htm
http://www.researchchannel.org/prog/displayevent.aspx?rID=4070
http://www.physics.uwo.ca/science_olympics/events/grades_11_to_12/london_bridge.html

http://www.ppgec.ufrgs.br/segovia/espaguete/software.html

http://bridgecontest.usma.edu/manual.htm

Download pasta_testing.pdf

and my own test results

Download fettuccini_pasta_testing_data.doc

Patience and a Steady Hand

2008-05-13T19:18:18-04:00

Driving me Nuts; Fettuccini Pasta Testing

By Richard Williams 5/13/2008

“Steady as she goes.” What a correct statement to use in Pasta Testing. Not being able to see like I once was able to in the previous millennium, it is a big disadvantage in performing these delicate procedures. However, I am half way through this tedious part of my Barilla Fettuccini Bridge testing and it will not be very long when I will be able to present to the world the best possible test results of a very unlikely building material for school science projects. It is already being used elsewhere so I am not unique in my idea. Actually it has been fun and very interesting to do this testing to finish up on this whole Pasta Thing. I had to be inventive in my testing set ups because pasta is very brittle and being like that it breaks very easy. I broke many pieces just setting up different tests I wanted to run. When I release the results to the world I will have a much more avid description of things with pictures but for now let me announce to you that I have had some very, very surprising results to inform you with. Mind you that I am not a certified testing lab but having a general idea on these procedures and I’m getting a lot of information sent to me from engineers out there that want to see the final results as soon as I can finish. That also includes designers, teachers, university Professors, friends and family and not to forget the Barilla Pasta Company in Calabria, Italy and the Elmer’s Wood Glue company too. I strived to document every step and all tested data retrieved from this testing of the pasta. I know one thing for sure, I will never ever look at pasta in the same way again. The bridge itself will soon be presented on its special platform to the newest North West Career Technical Academy here close to where I live. (http://ccsd.net/schools/nwcta/) It will be housed in a large display case until such time as the testing of it can be done. Maybe it will occur during the next fall semester. With my industry contacts and such, I am getting some pretty good things donated for their library and also the possibility of some donated hardware as well like the Data Acquisition Modules from the National Instruments company in Texas. (http://www.ni.com/) I filed the paper work so we will see what happens. They said they are studying request for now.

The young adults that are enrolled in this high school academy are really good students and America needs them badly. For too long it has been more fashionable to get the MBA degree and forget about the sciences that go begging for talent. This is why I have thrown my full support behind SolidWorks and the STEM initiative. I also throw my support to all the teachers worldwide. I know what it is like to teach a bunch of youngsters in all the different age groups and behaviors and phases of life. So I have been there and done that. It is not an easy job and our teachers in the world deserve lots of credit for doing this work and all the support from everyone else. I will endeavor to do that job faithfully for the rest of my retirement career. Our normal school season is fast approaching the end for this year and I have only one more class to give a speaking engagement to. It is a special school that helps those children with bad behaviors and bad social skills. I’ve got pretty good at doing this over the last three and a half years. These students need this school. Nevada realizes that a disruptive child is very hard to teach and he or she stops the learning process in the class room for everyone else too. They are important to the USA also. They are important to Nevada, our school district and to me. Talk to you soon.