Science Help?

Question

Alright, i have to make a thing that holds an egg and falls seven meters without the egg breaking (no hard boiled) on the outside I can use a cardboard carton, six straws, a meter of string, two balloons, three big paper clips, 3 rubber bands, a plastic ziploc bag and i can put anything i want on the inside. It has to fall as fast as possible and i put in the egg right before i do it so like no concrete. I kind of know what i want to do but any suggestions?

Alright, i have to make a thing that holds an egg and falls seven meters without the egg breaking (no hard boiled) on the outside I can use a cardboard carton, six straws, a meter of string, two balloons, three big paper clips, 3 rubber bands, a plastic ziploc bag and i can put anything i want on the inside. It has to fall as fast as possible and i put in the egg right before i do it so like no concrete. I kind of know what i want to do but any suggestions? Keep in mind, I can use ANYTHING inside but only the materials given on the outside, as long as i can put the egg in the carton after it is completed.

Answer 1

an egg is strongest on the axis throught the 'point', so along the oval shape. The most successful designs have 2 key concepts.
1st, a way to hold the egg such the point is held down and the pressure applied to that tip.
2nd a part of the container that collapses upon impact such that the egg travels a short distance from where it is at the moment of contact, towards the pavement.
So think of a missile with the egg encased at the fin end, then the nose collapses on impact.

Answer 2

I would use the string and rubber bands to suspend the egg in the center of the box. This would be done by cutting the rubber bands into 8 sections (assuming you are allowed to do this) and combining them with 8 pieces of string. Put the egg in the ziploc bag and attach the rubberband/strings to it and the 8 corners on the inside of the box. If you measure well the bag will be held in the center of the box. This will keep it from receiving an impact through the box from the fall.

Answer 3

Try this.
Weave a net from the string that can be used to suspend the egg. fill the zip-lock bag with viscous vegetable oil, suspend the egg in the net at the center of the zipper portion so that the egg is at the top of the bag surrounded by the oil, with the greatest volume of the oil below the egg.
The zipper can hold the top of the net in position.
Inflate the two balloons and paperclip them to the top two corners of the bag to serve as a drag to keep the bag up-right while falling. The oil will serve to evenly disburse the shock of impact over the surface of the egg when the bag hits the ground.

Answer 4

I saw a competetion on mythbusters to drop an egg from the top of a building....one guy got a long piece of string and only had to drop the egg less than a meter!! a technical thing as he still dropped it from the requisite height...laterial thinking! You could use the string (shame its not any longer) to lessen the distance the egg has to fall and use some of the other ideas to help.

FYI the other guy used rubber gloves and blew them up with the egg nestled between them inside a bag.
I guess is trying to decrease or disperse the energy when the egg hits the grouns and other people have come up with some great ones!

Answer 5

Fill one balloon with lots of water. Add the egg to the second balloon and inflate with air. Attach to the first balloon, opening to opening, with a meter of string threaded through the center of the box. Hold the box snug to the bottom of the air balloon with a twisted paperclip or two underneath on the string. Hold by the top of the inflated balloon and drop.

The weight of the water balloon rams the pair down to the ground. The air balloon keeps things aligned by air resistance during fall. The bottom balloon hits and bursts. By the time the egg arrives another meter down in the second balloon it is slowly floating down and hits the soft box that hits the ground first.