Mythbusters Workshops - Completed
Ok so the 2 day Mythbusters Workshop has been completed and I think it was a success. We did workshops for both teachers and students in both the morning and afternoon.We started off the morning with the Killer Coconut experiment.
For this experiment CRO's (Cathode Ray Oscilloscope) were set up and attached to motion sensors which the kids built. All of this was placed on carts that were covered in clothes to help block out the natural infared rays that the sun provides.
Adrian checks the readings on the CRO's to see what kind readings were given off so the velocity of the coconut can be calculated.
Next was the most exciting part of the experiment; simulating a worst case scenario. Picture a bald man having a nap while lying underneath an 8m tall palm tree resting his head on a rock.
Aidan calls out to those under the bridge to clear the area.
To simulate this we placed a watermelon underneath the bridge. It should be noted that a watermelon is considerably more fragile than a human head. We attempted to take a video of the fall to see the effects of the impact.
The camera is setup to take a movie of the next drop.
Once everything was setup the demonstration was about to begin!
The unsuspecting watermelon sits waiting underneath the bridge.
The kids were invited to go up onto the bridge to get an arial view of the drop.
All others were warned to keep behind the black and yellow warning tape.
The aftermath...
Moving on to the Mobile Phone workshop, here is a completed circuit, tada! I built it all myself, soldering work and all! Basically the way it works is, you dial a phone number on your cellphone which causes the antenna to resonate and pick up the signal which causes the LED (light emitting diode) to light up.
The teachers thought this would be a great idea ot have one of these on each desk in the school to keep the kids from texting each other during class. haha!
After an eventful morning it was time for lunch. Because I was helping out with the workshops I got to go to the teachers lunch at the Eco Centre instead of the hotdogs and boxed juice lunch that the students got in the Undercroft.
Painting at the Griffith Eco Centre
Lunch were sandwiches made on ciabatta bread with basil pesto mayonnaise, sweet potato, "rocket" (assorted leaf lettuce) and sundried tomato. A surprisingly good combination if I do say so myself! There was also fresh fruit and assorted cakes for dessert with coffee, tea and water to drink.
After lunch it was back to the workshops, this time the Destructive EMP workshop. Here David Thiel the head of the Microelectrical Engineering department gives a talk on GPS systems and various ways the signal could be disrupted; for the teacher workshop I got to do this talk.
For those of you wondering the big grey thing on the right is the horn we used to send out the microwaves to try and disrupt the GPS.
Here the kids take a look at the GPS to see that the satellite signals have been disrupted.
It was 2 long but fun days and I learned a lot and got to meet a lot of new people. Doing the presentation for the teachers was fun too. I even learned a new skill, how to solder and got to teach it to some of the people who were doing the workshops. In some ways the whole experience kind of reminded me of my cake decorating instructor days.
Tomorrow I hope to get out to the city and do a bit of last minute shopping before my big trip to Sydney and Cairns. And hopefully I'll be able to see the new Harry Potter movie sometime this week as well!
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