Stitch the positive connections in your circuit 81
Stitch the ground connections in your circuit 83
Test Your Circuit 85
Improve Your Cap 85
Electrical Engineering and the Iron Triangle 85
Project 7: Now You′re Cooking! 88
Early Mechanical Engineering 88
Archimedes the engineer 89
Energy everywhere 90
The First Law of Thermodynamics 90
Materials 91
Design Your Solar Oven 92
The Second Law of Thermodynamics 92
Oven design criteria 92
Build Your Design 94
Build the food chamber 94
Add the oven insulation 95
Attach the solar reflector 97
Test Your Design Plan 98
Improve Your Cooker 99
Solar Cooking and the Iron Triangle 100
Mini Project: Vdara Death Ray 102
Project 8: Roller Coaster Mania 103
Introduction to Roller Coasters 104
Mass in a roller coaster system 105
Energy in a roller coaster system 105
Materials 106
Model Your Coaster with Technology 106
Design Your Roller Coaster 112
Build Your Roller Coaster 113
Test Your Roller Coaster 116
Improve Your Roller Coaster 117
Entertainment Engineering and the Iron Triangle 117
Appendix: Cool Tools (and More!) 120
Camille McCue, Ph.D, is a veteran STEM educator who has teletaught for NASA and PBS and instructed math, tech, and engineering in the classroom. She currently teaches in Las Vegas, NV.
An engineering book for kids!
Engineers are experts on how things work. This book is your first step to developing the skills you need to design and build like an engineer. Tinker with fun projects that apply the Engineering Cycle to solve real–world problems.
Load the bridge—design a virtual bridge then build and test a fun pasta model
Alien invasion—design and craft a wearable toy using an electronic circuit and 3D printing
Ride the coaster—construct a tiny roller coaster with drops, twists, and loops
Technology Requirements: Hardware – PC or tablet with Internet connection running Windows 7 or higher or Mac with Internet connection running Mac OS X 10.7 or higher Other materials – Common household materials including scissors, a trash bag, a marble, cotton balls, marshmallows, canola oil, foam tubing, and a kitchen scale (full materials list in the Introduction).