Looped Knex Coaster with a working crank

Vrooom! The coaster reaches the top of the hill and is off!  In less than 20 seconds it covers the entire track if the design was built correctly. It is a ton of fun to build and quite challenging for the students. More than 3500 pieces are assembled by students in different hours during the build.

One of the major challenges is that the instructions are simply a 2D picture. There is no way to turn the design around on the page to see what is happening in 3D. Once students get the hang of it, it is pretty smooth. Initially the challenge is very real though.

Another interesting part of the build is how the different hours are like different shifts on a build site.  As students build they have to check the work of the previous group and quite often fix errors that occurred.

Once the build in completed it is time to test the coaster. There are always sections that need tweaking, but with some effort students finally get to see the coaster complete the circuit.

Stay tuned for more posts as we try to create a carriage for our Go Pro to complete the track.