Bridge Deux

So I would have had the bridge broken and status on how it fared reported, but the region experienced an ice storm. All daily activities were put on hold for a few days. This gave me a chance to test my bridge and I'm glad I did because the results were mediocre, at best.

Seeing the failures of the last bridge I made a second one, made many improvements, and it could even be mistaken as a bridge to boot. This new bridge has two "logs" again but they are laid like bricks to form a wall of sorts, then at the top two toothpicks broken in half give the structure stability.

The new breaking date is set for tomorrow, the second of February, results to follow.


UPDATE: The bridge was broken today, the second of Feb. On the way into the building it was damaged and two of the top support rods were severed, resulting in only a 607% efficiency. I am going to rebuild the supports, and try again. I believe it can hold much more as the main supports were in perfect condition, even after the force of the breaking.

Toothpick Bridge

Well jumping right into the blog, today I made a toothpick bridge. It's for school, but why not share my findings with the world.

We had strict guidelines to follow: no more than 50 toothpicks, only "woodglues" so only PVA's and aliphatic resin emulsion, and other various building restrictions.


I decided on Titebond 2 for the glue to use on this, Titebond seems to be the leading developer of glues and this product was best for this instance. http://www.newwoodworker.com/reviews/titebond.html that site helped a lot in deciding which glue to decide on.


Basically my bridge is two beams of interlaced toothpicks, very simple and they seem to be strong. The construction of each beam is 5 toothpicks interlaced halfway on the other and a 6th toothpick, broken in half, to fill in the gap. Do that 2 more times and glue those together. At this point I put all of that in my table vice to apply even pressure. Then I made another. These will be placed over the 15cm gap and a block that the weight is mounted to will keep the two in place, or so I hope.

I'm hoping my simplicity wont cause me to fail this whole project but if it does, I will have learned a lot, and in the end that's what really matters. Or so I'm told... The goal is to have the highest efficiency, the weight carried divided by the weight of the bridge. Results will be reported on Tuesday.