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4.1.3 Car Design
4.1.3.1 Lego Design
The initial design idea was to build the car using an assortment of Lego bricks
and stud plates. Seeing as Lego construction is extremely easy, it would
eliminate the need for power tools when designing the dimensions of the car.
Some of the Lego pieces that would be needed for this design path are listed as
follows.
Dimensions
5’’ x 8’’ Lego stud plate foundation
(4) 4 x 1 stud Lego bricks
(2) 12 x 1 stud brick
(4) 4 x 8 stud brick
(3) 4 x 6 stud brick
(4) 1 x 10 stud brick
With these bricks and maybe a few more depending on what is needed when
building the car actually begins the base and foundation of the car will be built.
Thought also needs to go into housing the two Neodymium magnets that will
cause levitation above the track. Since no one in the group has access to a
substantial amount of Legos, and buying individual Lego bricks per design could
get expensive, we will not be building our car using Lego parts.
4.1.3.2 Wood Design
The other option for building the car is just prototyping out of wood. The type of
wood is up for consideration a few factors should be considered when
purchasing the material.
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Price
Hardness/durability
Ease of cutting
We will have access to power tools, but the less labor required the more
productive the team will ultimately be. The wood block that will be purchased
has the following dimensions, which if not available can be cut with a table saw to
scale down to a 7’’ x 4’’ x .5’’ wood block
For the car foundation hardwood would be ideal, because drilling and shaping
needs to be done to glue the permanent magnets to the bottom of the wood
block. Balsa wood is too soft for our purposes, but was considered. Pine will be
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