4-H ENGINEERING DESIGN CHALLENGE 2016
Rube Goldberg
Crush and Recycle…
an empty aluminum soft drink can and put it into a recycling container.
A STEM PROJECT FOR YOUTH WHO HAVE COMPLETED THIRD THROUGH EIGHTH GRADES
MISSION
Our goal is to encourage critical thinking, creativity, innovation, and problem solving in a nontraditional learning event and to have FUN in the process. Youth who have completed third
through eighth grades can compete in the 4-H Engineering Design Challenge. Participants will
apply their STEM knowledge and skills to solve problems by identifying and researching them,
then making and implementing a plan to design a solution.
(rōōb’ gōld’bûrg’)
. [After Reuben (
) L.
(18831970), inventor of such contrivances.] Of, relating to, or being a contrivance that
accomplishes by complicated means what apparently could have been
accomplished simply.
Webster’s II New College Dictionary, 1995.
The 4-H Engineering Design Challenge for 2016 is to design and build a Rube Goldberg (RG) that
crushes an empty aluminum soft drink can and puts it into a recycling container. Rube Goldberg
(1883-1970) was a Pulitzer Prize-winning cartoonist who was best known for his wacky inventions.
They appeared as cartoons in daily newspapers for about 50 years, and his popularity made him a
cultural touchstone.
A RG is an overly complex contraption that does a simple task. The best ones use everyday items
in a whimsical way. They interact as a series of chain-reaction steps that culminate in
accomplishing the task. In the 4-H Engineering Design Challenge, youth not only employ physics
and engineering, but humor and storytelling, to create their RGs. Teams are encouraged to create
a theme for their RG and incorporate it into a story.
Teams that build a RG and complete the supplemental recordkeeping documents (journal or
record of their work and a poster or other summary description of the work) can demonstrate
their machine at their county fair. Teams that qualify at county fair will earn a trip to the
Minnesota State Fair to show their RG.
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GETTING STARTED
Follow these steps to participate in the 4-H Engineering Design Challenge.
Page
Contents
1. Form a team
4
2. Register your team in 4HOnline
4
3. Design and build your machine!
RG specifications
Theme and story
4
4. Recordkeeping materials
Team journal
Summary presentation
6
5. Design Process Stages
7
6. Frequently asked questions
Questions about RG
Questions about this year’s challenge
Questions about RG teams
8
7. Exhibiting your machine at state and county fairs
Fair registration
Transporting and storing your machine
10
8. Fair judging
What the ribbon colors mean
Judging process
State fair
11
Important dates
12
Judging form
13
Judging rubric
14
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1. FORM A TEAM

A team must have at least

Youth who will have completed third through eighth grades by the end of the 2015-2016
school year are eligible to be on a RG team. A team may have members from any of these
grades. Youth who have completed any grade beyond eighth are not eligible to be RG team
members, but they may act as youth coaches. (See the last bullet in this section.)

In addition to the 3-10 youth, each team must have at least two adult volunteer leaders.
Each adult volunteer must complete the 4-H volunteer screening process. For more on
becoming a 4-H volunteer, visit www.4-h.umn.edu/volunteer.

All team members (youth and adult)
before the team registers
with the Extension Center for Youth Development (as described in section 2). Youth who
wish to be on a RG team but are not already 4-H members must enroll in 4-H before joining
the team. Find enrollment information at www.4-h.umn.edu/be-a-4-H-member/ or contact
your county Extension office. You can find contact information for your county Extension
office at www.extension.umn.edu/county/.

4-H members in high school or above cannot be team members, but they are welcome to
work with teams as youth coaches. Youth coaches do not replace the adult volunteer
leaders, but work with the team as an additional resource.
youth team members, but no more than
2. REGISTER YOUR TEAM FOR THIS EVENT
.
Register by May 15, 2016!
Teams who’ve taken part in the challenge in earlier years have told us they wish they’d started
working earlier than they did. We recommend that your team register by May 15 in order to get
started on designing and building your machine and take advantage of the state-wide
informational conference call early in the summer (see page 11). The absolute deadline for you to
register your team is July 1 OR your county’s county fair registration date, whichever comes
earlier. (Check with your 4-H program coordinator to find out your county’s fair registration date.)
See page 12 for county fair registration instructions.
NEW THIS YEAR! Register in 4HOnline
Unlike in previous years, there is no longer a paper form registration for the Engineering Design
Rube Goldberg challenge.
After both team leaders have
completed their registration in 4HOnline, youth team members and coaches will be able to
register. (It may take a couple of days after the adults have registered before youth are able to
register.) Adult leaders will be notified when their team’s registration is open for youth. Find
complete registration instructions on the Engineering Design Challenge: Rube Goldberg webpage.
3. DESIGN AND BUILD YOUR MACHINE!
The 2016 task is to
We encourage you to use everyday objects such as a bucket, a cooking pot, string, books, and
other household or garage items to build your RG. Be creative!
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RG SPECIFICATIONS
MACHINE SPECIFICATION
REQUIREMENTS OR LIMITATIONS
Complete the official task (crush an empty aluminum
soft drink can and put it into a recycling container)
Required
Safe for participants and observers
Required
Written list of all steps in your RG
Required
Number of steps
Minimum: 10
Physical size of RG (See tip about transporting and
storing RG on page 11.)
Minimum: no minimum size
Maximum: 6 feet × 6 feet × 6 feet
Single run time to complete the task
Minimum: None
Maximum 2 minutes
Reset time (time required to set your machine up again
after a run)
Maximum: 20 minutes
Air compressor hoses running to the machine
Maximum 1 hose
AC or DC power cords running to the machine
Maximum 1 cord
Air compressor hoses and power cords used within the
machine boundaries
Unlimited
Objects flying beyond machine boundaries
Objects must stay within overall
maximum boundary of 6 feet x 6 feet x
6 feet.
Corporate logos
Allowed with written permission from
the logo owner.
Use of live animals
Not allowed
Hazardous (toxic, noxious, dangerous) materials,
explosives, or flames
Not allowed
Use of profane, indecent, or lewd expressions
Not allowed
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Maximum: unlimited
THEME AND STORY
While developing the design for your machine, consider the theme you’d like to have for your
machine and the story to go with the theme. The theme and story should be a fun part of creating
your machine, not a stumbling block—you might even find that your theme or story makes the
design and building of the machine a richer experience. As a team, consider how you will share
your story. Remember your team will have the opportunity to make a presentation to the
audience and judges. Videos of your presentation, while useful for documenting the process of
building your Rube Goldberg, are often cumbersome in a fair setting.
4. RECORDKEEPING MATERIALS
Reflecting on and recording one’s learning are an important but often overlooked component of
youth development. Each team needs to document their progress and how they build their RG by
keeping a written record or journal of the work they do throughout the design and building
process, and also preparing a summary presentation to illustrate the work.
These recordkeeping requirements must be completed by the time your machine is presented at
your county fair. They will be judged along with your machine, so if your journal is kept in a file
on a computer, bring a printed copy with you to the fair.
TEAM JOURNAL
The team journal is a record of the team’s progress throughout the process of designing and
building its RG. The purpose of the journal is to give the team members a means of reflecting on
what they’ve learned and accomplished each time they met, and how/whether the engineering
design process guided the team’s work. The journal also provides documentation to the fair
conference judges of the team’s work, including research, successes, setbacks and progress. The
journal can be a handwritten notebook or notes kept in a word processing document on a
computer. We recommend that each time your team meets you use the last 10 to 15 minutes of
the meeting to add an entry to your team journal. Only one person from the team needs to make
the entry, but we encourage teams to rotate this role through different team members each time
and outlines some
they meet. The following page illustrates the
questions that may help the team record their meeting entries.
SUMMARY PRESENTATION
The purpose of the summary is to assist the team in describing their experience during the
conference judging at the fair. The summary can be a one- or two-page account that highlights the
team’s experience, or it can be a poster, photographs, a video or any other medium the team
wants to use to demonstrate their team’s experience. The team may also want to display the
summary for fair visitors to see (but this is not required). While the journal helps the team think
about what they’ve learned in each small step, the summary highlights the “aha moments,” the
fun, and maybe also some of the frustrations the team had from the time they first began to plan
their machine to the day they decided it was finished.
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5. DESIGN PROCESS STAGES
The design process has five stages:
Problem
definition
1. Problem definition
2. Information gathering
Redesign
Information
gathering
3. Idea generation
4. Testing and decision-making
5. Redesign
Testing and
decisionmaking
Idea
generation
REFLECTING ON YOUR PROCESS
Problem definition:

What is one problem that your team ran into today?
Information gathering:



What did your team know already that helped you think of a solution?
What more does your team need to know to help you think of a solution?
How does your team plan to gather the information that you need?
Idea generation and decision-making:


List the ideas that your team came up with for solving the problem.
How did your team decide which of these ideas to test?


Did it work? If yes, how? If not, what more did your team do to solve the problem?
Write down the information/data that your team collects from testing to help you
make a decision/solve the problem.

What did your team do to improve your design/or solve the problem?
Testing:
Redesign:
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6. FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
QUESTIONS ABOUT RG
A step in the machine is a
from one action to another action; identical
transfers of energy in succession should be counted as 1 step.
Example A sequence of dominos hitting each other counts as 1 step. Counting 100 dominoes as
100 steps is repetitive and not in the spirit of Rube Goldberg.
Yes, but their use must fit within the definition of a step. Steps that use controllers
should be clearly stated in the written step list and include detailed information on how the
transfer of energy is accomplished. Using controllers as a fail-safe is illegal and will result in
disqualification.
A ball falls onto a switch connected to a controller that turns on a motor.
NOT ALLOWED: If the ball misses the switch but the controller still starts the motor, the controller
is not transferring energy from one action to another action; it is acting as a fail-safe instead of a
step and is illegal.
ALLOWED: If the ball hits the switch and the controller starts the motor.
Answer: Once the first step in your machine takes place (e.g. someone pushes a ball onto a ramp),
the machine should function all the way to the end without a person touching it. However,
sometimes the machine may fail to reach the last steps to accomplish the task. If a machine fails
before it completes the task, it may be necessary for a person to start it again from the point
where it failed. That is a human intervention. See the example judging form on page 13 for what
judges will look for in the RGs.
No. All entries must be new machines created and built for entry into this competition.
: No, your machine can be smaller than the maximum allowed dimensions, it just can’t be
larger.
: This year’s task is recycling a soft drink can. You could select a theme that ties in with
where or when you might recycle a can (for example, your theme might be a bowling alley or a
park or camping or even a color). Once you think of your theme, the story will begin to take shape.
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: Information gathering is a key step in the Design Process. Some of the information may
be what you and your teammates already knew before you started to think about your machine. In
that case, your source is your other teammates or maybe the class in school where you learned
the information, or maybe a parent or relative or a 4-H volunteer who taught it to you.
But you probably won’t know everything before you start. The library, your teachers, the Internet,
your family and friends are all good sources for helping you figure out how to solve a problem.
You might also visit a factory or an engineer to get information.
QUESTIONS ABOUT THIS YEAR’S CHALLENGE
:
: Yes, the can must first be crushed and then be placed into the container.
: No, it can be any container you designate as a recycling container.
: No. The can should be an undented, empty soft drink can.
QUESTIONS ABOUT RG TEAMS
Yes. A team may have youth from more than one grade, as long as they are between third
and eighth grades.
Yes. However, the team must be affiliated with a specific county’s 4-H program. If they
exhibit their Rube Goldberg design at a county fair, it will be the fair of the county they’re
affiliated with. If they qualify for the Minnesota State Fair, they will attend during that county’s
encampment.
Yes. It’s best if the whole team comes to the fair, but we understand some members
might already have started school or be on a family vacation at the time of their county’s
encampment at the state fair. A team that qualifies to demonstrate their machine at the state fair
does not need to have all members present at the state fair. They do need to have enough team
members to transport, assemble, demonstrate, and disassemble the machine. (This can mean
walking a couple of blocks from a parking lot to the 4-H building with the machine at the state
come
come to this team event!
fair.) As many team members as
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Yes. The engineering design process (p. 8) encourages us to learn from experience and
redesign to improve the creation!
You can contact Colleen Byrne (stem4h@umn.edu) at the University of Minnesota
Extension Center for Youth Development. There will also be one or two
(or
conference calls) for adult volunteer team leaders; please bring your questions, comments and
suggestions to those meetings. Meeting dates have not yet been determined, but the first meeting
will take place after May 15.
7. EXHIBITING YOUR MACHINE AT COUNTY AND STATE FAIRS
FAIR REGISTRATION
County Fair
If a team decides to show its RG at its county fair, registration for the county fair will be at the
county level and carried out through the county fair registration process. It is the responsibility of
the team (most likely the adult volunteer leaders) to contact their county office and let staff know
the team intends to enter their machine for judging at the county fair. When it’s time to register
for their county fair, county 4-H staff will share the necessary exhibitor information/instructions
and county fair premium book with the team so that they can register to demonstrate their
machine.
If you have questions about county fair registration, please contact your county Extension office
(find your county office at http://www.4-h.umn.edu/county).
State Fair
The county teams advancing to the state fair will sign up through the state fair registration
process facilitated by the county 4-H program coordinator. If you have questions about state fair
registration that your county 4-H program coordinator can’t answer, contact Amber Greeley at the
Extension Center for Youth Development runk0014@umn.edu 612-624-8198.
TRANSPORTING AND STORING YOUR MACHINE
County Fair
Space availability differs from one county fair to another. Teams must contact their county
Extension staff regarding their plans to exhibit their machine at the county fair. The staff will be
able to give you guidelines on whether or not you’ll be able to drive right up to the exhibit space
at your county fair to unload (and reload) your machine, and whether or not it can be stored at the
fairgrounds before or after the fair takes place.
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State Fair
Teams that earn a trip to the state fair will compete there during their assigned encampment. A
team’s machine will be at the fair only on the one full day of its encampment—it cannot be stored
at the state fairgrounds before or after the team’s encampment.
Tips from previous participants
 We will make an effort to arrange with the Minnesota State Fair to allow transportation
assistance onto and off of the fairgrounds (early in the morning and late in the evening),
but Minnesota 4-H must comply with the Minnesota State Fair policy and can’t guarantee
transportation assistance. If Minnesota 4-H is allowed to provide assistance, information
will be communicated to teams shortly before the state fair opens.
Whether we are allowed to offer transportation assistance or not, you may want to make
your machine easy to break down into transportable segments, and bring dollies or
wagons, etc. to help you transport the machine to the 4-H building. (Parking at the state
fair can be crowded, and you might have to transport your machine several blocks on foot.)
We do understand that transporting your machine can be a difficult process.
 The RG judging area in the 4-H building at the state fairgrounds is a carpeted area. If your
machine needs to be assembled on a hard, smooth surface, you should bring that surface
to the fair.
8. FAIR JUDGING
All entries will be judged using the conference judging process, where a team meets with the
judges at the fair and talks with them about their machine, including developing the design,
building it, solving problems, identifying lessons and their applications and working as a team.
Final ribbon placement will be based 50% on the team members’ knowledge of that process and
50% on the machine itself.
Ribbon placements will be purple, blue, red or white.
WHAT THE RIBBON COLORS MEAN

Purple. The exhibit meets all standards. The exhibitor has shown complete understanding
of what, how, and why the exhibit was done, and has a thorough knowledge of the subject.
The exhibit and workmanship are extraordinary and need no improvement.

Blue. The exhibit meets most standards. The exhibitor can explain what, how, and why the
exhibit was done and has a good knowledge of the subject. The exhibit is well organized
and well done.

Red. The exhibit meets some standards. The exhibitor can somewhat explain what, how,
and why the exhibit was done and has a fair knowledge of the subject. Some
improvements may be needed on the exhibit.

White. The exhibit meets few standards and lacks the quality of other exhibits. The
exhibitor cannot adequately explain the what, how, and why of the exhibit. Possibly they
have overlooked a safety flaw. Improvement is needed in either the exhibit, the knowledge
of the subject, or both.
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JUDGING PROCESS

The team will participate in a public presentation and conference-judging-style experience.

Teams will share their journals during conference judging and review the process for the
design and construction of their RG.

Team members will share with the judge their individual contributions to the construction
of the machine.

The team will demonstrate its machine for the judge and the general public.

Teams that complete the judging process will be awarded a purple, blue, red, or white
ribbon at county and state fairs.

For a better understanding of the judging process, take a look at the example judging form
and judging rubric on pages 13-15.
STATE FAIR
State fair judging will take place during your county’s assigned encampment at the Minnesota
State Fair. Team judging will take place in the exhibit center space of the 4-H building. Teams will
be allotted two hours to set up their Rube Goldberg. Teams will be assigned a judging time during
their county’s encampment.
IMPORTANT DATES
WHAT’S HAPPENING
May 15
We recommend that you register by this time for the challenge
Early summer
Statewide informational conference call for RG team leaders. (Date
and time to be determined.)
July 1
Last date to register for the challenge. If your county fair registration
date falls before July 1, that date is the last date your team can
register.
May, June, July, August
Register through your county Extension office to show your machine
at your county fair. Check with your 4-H program coordinator to find
out your county’s fair registration deadline.
June, July, August
County fairs throughout Minnesota
August 25-September 5
Minnesota State Fair
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ENGINEERING DESIGN CHALLENGE
RUBE GOLDBERG JUDGING FORM
Grade range of
team members
Date
Much
Improvement
Needed
Purple
Blue
Red
White
Very Good




Team Name
Number of team
members at judging
Some
Improvement
Needed
County
Theme or story about the machine
Rube Goldberg Machine
Sequences of steps are clear and described; energy transfer is described;
simple machines are identified
Degree of machine complexity
Degree of innovation, creative use of everyday items in new ways
Degree of human intervention
Machine run time:
Up to 2 minutes—very good
2-3 minutes—some improvement needed
Over 3 minutes—much improvement needed
Worked as a team, role of each team member is identified and described
Conference Judging
Discovered ways problems were solved and described using examples;
demonstrates perseverance
Identified “lessons” learned and how they apply beyond RG
Conducted research (sought information and knowledge)
Elements of the design process stages are evident
Provided a record or journal that documents the process of building the RG
Machine Specifications
Number of Steps (≥10)
Task completed
Objects leaving the machine
Machine does not exceed size requirement
Machine meets rule and safety requirements
Specifications met
Specifications not
met
Rube Goldberg
Judging Rubric
WORTHY
Task completed
Fits criteria of RGM
(simple task
completed in
complicated
manner), sequence of
steps are clear and
described, energy
transfer is described,
simple machines are
identified
Degree of
complication
Degree of innovation
– tool or machine is
used in new/different
way, used creatively,
demonstrated
thinking outside of
the box
Worked as a team;
role of each team
member is identified
and described
Ways that problems
were solved are
described, using
examples;
demonstrating
perseverance
Identification of
“lessons” learned and
how they apply
beyond RGM
GOOD
Task completed with multiple human
interventions in the specified time
constraints OR
Task completed with 2 human
interventions in the specified time
constraints
EXCELLENT
Task completed with one human
intervention in the specified time
constraints OR
Task completed with no human
intervention in the specified time
constraints
In written or in verbal presentation, one
of these criteria were not described
clearly:
 sequence of steps are clearly
described
 energy transfer is described
 simple machines are identified
Meets machine specification requirements
and limitations
In written or in verbal presentation the
sequence of steps are clearly described,
energy transfer is described, simple
machines are identified
Simple transfers of energy with little
degree of difficulty or complication
Less than half of the steps demonstrated a
difficult and precise transfer of energy
Over half of the steps demonstrated a
difficult and precise transfer of energy
None identified
Less than half of the steps demonstrate an
innovative, different, creative use of tools
Over half of the steps demonstrate an
innovative, different, creative use of tools
(tools/machines are “re-purposed”)
No teamwork identified
Team was dominated by one or more
members; unequal distribution of
workload or opportunity for input OR
roles were not clearly articulated
Each team member had a clearly defined
role that was articulated or demonstrated
to the evaluators in some method
None identified
Problem solving was evident but not
clearly described
Team was able to describe how one or
more problems were solved using
examples; demonstrated perseverance to
get through problems
None identified
Team did not or could not articulate what
they learned during this project
Team was able to describe what they
learned during this project and how those
lessons can be used in life
Task not completed OR
Task completed with multiple human
interventions outside of the specified
time constraints
Does not meet machine specification
requirements and there was not
discussion of the sequence of steps,
energy transfer or simple machines
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Rube Goldberg Judging Rubric
WORTHY
GOOD
Research (seeking of
information or
knowledge)
conducted
None identified
Team did not seek information outside of
the team
Elements of the
design process stages
are evident
None identified
Less than 3 of the practices are evident in
the project
EXCELLENT
Sources of knowledge or information
outside of the team were intentionally
consulted and incorporated into the
project
At least 3 of the design process stages are
evident





Problem definition
Information gathering
Idea generation
Testing and decision-making
Redesign
© 2015 Regents of the University of Minnesota. All rights reserved. University of Minnesota Extension is an equal opportunity educator and employer. In accordance with the Americans with
Disabilities Act, this material is available in alternative formats upon request. Direct requests to 612-624-2116.
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