ASME Improv Design CSU

Tonight there was an ASME (American Society of Mechanical Engineers) Improv Design contest. I didn't know about it until 10 minutes after it started. One of the people in a meeting I was in was heading to it so I tacked along. I've been to these before and they are always really fun. We get free food, and we get to make random cool stuff in a short time to accomplish a task.
This competition was a destroy the castle task. We had about 45 minutes to make a catapult out of some wood, a mouse trap, some Duct Tape, and some other random items (like straws and rubber bands).

Mouse Trap Catapult

Tonight there was an ASME (American Society of Mechanical Engineers) Improv Design contest. I didn't know about it until 10 minutes after it started. One of the people in a meeting I was in was heading to it so I tacked along. I've been to these before and they are always really fun. We get free food, and we get to make random cool stuff in a short time to accomplish a task.
This competition was a destroy the castle task. We had about 45 minutes to make a catapult out of some wood, a mouse trap, some Duct Tape, and some other random items (like straws and rubber bands).

The Competition

There were 5 teams of one person. ASME was anticipating more people (This was the smallest amount of people I've ever seen come to an improv design), but it was fun being able to do it by myself. I went with a very simple design. attach a stick to the mousetrap and put a small cup at the end. Let the mouse trap fling froward and hope it works.
The castle was 15 feet from the catapult. I got my design done first, so I was able to go and practice. THere were various trajectories that we could use from Nerf gun balls, corks, dice, and 3oz fishing weights. My catapult worked well with the fishing weight, since it rolled on the floor pretty well.
I ended up winning the competition (which was good for an ASME glass - I already have one of these from another improv design!) and a $10 gift card to Noodles. Woo!