America's Cup Toy Boat Kit

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Summary This unique creation was designed using Tinkercad and can be edited online at https://tinkercad.com/things/f... The America's Cup Toy Boat Kit showcases how physics is taught through 3D-printed toys, demonstrating its effectiveness in a Tech Camp where grades 4, 5, and 6 students learned physics principles. In a Rochester, NY elementary school, each of the 20 students built their own boat and tested it in a shoebox, fostering confidence in creatively making and fixing things through constructively hacking the design (changing sail shape and position, hull length, etc.). Instructions: - Print the kit of sailboat parts (designed to fit on the small Printerbot Simple bed). - Cut 4 equal straw pieces (4 inches long works well) for hulls. - Cut a 1 inch straw for attaching the tiller to the rudder. - Cut a straw for the mast (4 inches long works well). - Cut the triangle sail from colorful cellophane or plastic film and tape it to the 3D-printed booms. - Assemble the sailboat. - Fill the plastic box half full of water. - Float the boat in the water and adjust tiller and sail for a broad reach. - Gently blow on sail through a straw. - Each boat in the regatta has a shoebox, with sailors providing their own wind at the starting signal. - The object of the game is to go the length of the box without touching the sides when wind blows from various directions. Materials: - 3D printed parts: sail, booms, forward frame, aft frame, straw plugs, rudder and tiller. - 5 colorful soda straws. - Colorful cellophane food packaging. - Plastic shoebox and water. Lessons include: - Center-of-gravity and tipping over. - Angle of incidence and resulting forces on the sail. - How to steer a sailboat to go other than the way the wind is blowing. - The iterative design process (constructive hacking) where students can modify the boats to improve performance or fix flaws. Teachers can re-use the apparatus with subsequent classes.