Year 5 Mechanical Systems

This half term, year five have been busy designing and making their own sling shot car. We started the topic by discussing why we thought cars were so popular and how they are fuelled. We then learnt all about a mechanism, an input and an output. We enjoyed looking at how cars have changed over the years and were amazed at how much they have changed since the very first car was invented.

We were then given the following design brief:

'To design and make a self powered 'sling- shot car' including the design and construction of the car body, to race against your classmates.'

We looked at a variety of different car bodies and discussed the shape, size and purpose of each one. We then recapped our knowledge of air resistance and how we could apply this science to our design. It was then time to begin to plan our car's body. We carefully considered what it would look like from a birds eye view, front view and side view. As a class, we discussed and devised the following design criteria;

It must not slow the car down.
It must fit securely onto the chassis.
It must have a fun, bright and engaging design.

We had lots of fun planning and getting all of our ideas onto paper! It was then time to assemble our car chassis, axles with working wheels and a launching mechanism. We then designed and carefully cut out our side panels and roof of our car. This was a little bit fiddly because we had to carefully cut around the tabs. Finally, we secured our side panels and roof to our chassis.

Finally, it was time for the most important part... The Race! The children were all very enthusiastic and had lots of fun cheering each other on. A big well done to Muhammad in 5J and Luan in 5W for winning their class races!

Finally, we evaluated our final pieces. We thought very carefully about the new skills we had learnt throughout the topic, what we had enjoyed and what we found difficult. We were also very critical when thinking about how we would improve our cars if we were to ever make them again.