Bottle Car

For my final project. I chose repair & reuse. I made an bottle car.

To begin I gathered all the requirements first. Which is duct tape, scissors, Dr. pepper bottle (any) 4 plastic cups, 1 mini straw, 1 thick straw. 2 colored pencils, and 1 balloon. I than cut the thick straw into 2 halves.

My little brother had just broken his toy car. So I think this is an perfect opportunity for me to create him an bottle car which is able to move. Also allowing him to store his colored pencils somewhere cool.

What I brain stormed was I first began to make an 3d model of the bottle on tinker CAD. After the model I put an order of the fundamental of what should be done after another. Like what should I do after creating the wheels. How should I attach them inside or outside. How am I able to only allow the wheels to turn. So this is my 3D model of how it should turn out.

1. Used color pencils may not be the same length precisely.
2. Air may leak from the straw easily depending on the tape you used.
3. May be difficult to find different sizes of straws.

I did some research on how only the wheels are able to move because that is the most difficult part of making the bottle car move. For the wheels I realized the axel is what connects the 2 wheels of the vehicle. So as it rotates it rotates the wheels. So I used an color pencil as an axel. Added an straw around it which allowed the axel to only move inside the straw.

To start off, I got the 4 plastic cups and cut each one into a wheel. After I was done cutting all of them. I traced the center of the wheels and made a hole for each one of the wheels.

After being done with all the wheels. I then stuck a colored pencil through the center hole of the wheels. Then placed it on the side of the colored pencil. After I did this, I got one half of the thick straw I cut earlier and placed it around the colored pencil. Finally, I stuck the second wheel on the other side of the colored pencil.

Once I repeated step 3 and had a second pair of 2 wheels. I then attached both pairs on the bottle with duct tape to the front and back of the bottle. The thicker straw only touching the bottle allows the colored pencil to rotate freely along with the wheels.

After being done with the structure of the bottle car I had planned. Then I needed the mini straw attached on top of the bottle car and the adjustable side of the mini straw facing down on back of the bottle car. But before all this I attached the balloon to the nonadjustable side of the mini straw using duct tape.

For the final step, I attached the straw on the bottle car using duct tape. I taped the balloon part of the straw on the front of the bottle car. For the adjustable side of the straw. I taped it on the back. This is because the adjustable side will be like an exhaust pushing air on the ground creating an push. Allowing the bottle car to move. To refuel simply blow air from the straw.

My experience while making this product looked honestly easy because I had every resource. But I realized things are not as easy as they may look. This project was very difficult for me but very creative. To use your mind to the extent. But things are not fun when they aren't challenging!