ExCEL Self-Reflection Report 2 : Royal Engineering Day – UTM Catapult Challenge

The poster of the UTM Catapult Challenge which is held on 6^th March 2020.

Our group are discussing about the ways to build a catapult and the different types of catapult with the given materials by the organiser. This was taken in the beginning of the event when everyone is still unfamiliar with each other.

This is the catapult built by our group. We rebuilt this catapult twice in order to get it a very good shape. The catapult is hard to build because it’s only assembled together with rubber bands.

Me and my group testing the catapult on the stage.

The stage of the field with 2 tall recycle bags at the side which worth 5 points and the middle low platform with 10 points. The goal is to use the catapult to get the ping pong into the bags or the center platform and gain points.

Reporting:

           On 6 March 2020, I joined an event called Royal Engineering Festival 2020: UTM Catapult Challenge. This event was organized by committee member of Kolej Tuanku Canselor at Dewan Astana (S01).  The objective of this event is to promote the engineering spirit and challenge ourselves to make a catapult with limited resources. The purpose of this event is also to enhance our ability to imagine and improve our hands-on performance. This also gave me a chance to apply some physics knowledge and be creative on creating something. This event started around 12pm and ended around 4pm.

            After some briefing and ice breaking session, the organizer divided all the participants into a group of 5 members with the total of 10 groups. Me and my group members brainstormed and design the catapult using only ice cream sticks and rubber bands and also with bottle cap. We could not fit the ping pong ball into the given bottle cap as it always fall off before shooting so the organizer decided to give each of the group a plastic spoon for a better start. We all then have an hour or less to design the catapult and test the catapult on the stage which have the field designed. There are two bags on the side is worth 5 points each and the middle one is worth 10 points. When the time is up, each group have one trial run before the actual shooting. Each group can shoot only twice. Our group almost got into the middle one but it went outside in the end. Even though my group dint got any points, it was exciting to see other groups design and got into the middle one.

           The event ended with the closing ceremony and prize giving for the top 3 winners of the catapult challenge. After that the organisers give us some refreshments such as Gardenia bread and Chrysanthemum tea packet before we leave the hall. It was a fun event and it improved my experience to work in a group.

Responding:

          This event is quite fun and interesting event for me because I really like to challenge myself to create something out of limited resources. At first before the event started, I felt nervous because there’s a lot of new faces and students from different faculties. So during the ice breaking session, I felt lucky enough to be in a group with one of my coursemates and the rest of the members are either seniors or junior from School of Electrical Engineering and School of Computing. After a brief introduction about ourselves, the main event started with giving us the materials to build the catapult.

          Before starting the design of the catapult, we have some problems in dividing the task as we never worked together as a group before. After this event, I felt awkward working together with newly met people and it is quite challenging and it taught me how to tolerate with people especially when we are trying to accomplish a task together. Next, one funny thing I realised is that when most of the group started looking for ideas using their smartphones, some groups end up having the same design of the catapult especially those that found tutorial build of catapult from YouTube.

           In the process of building the catapult, I felt excited especially when we created the base structure of the catapult and started to test with the ping pong ball. But before we even started to shoot the ping pong ball, the ball kept falling off from the bottle cap as it is too small for the ball. As most of the group started facing this problem as well, the organizer decided to give us a plastic spoon to ensure the ball won’t fall off before the shooting process. I felt impressed with one of my groupmates as he is able to do hands-on so well compared to my clumsy hand where I always tend to fail to do so.

Relating:

            This event reminds me of one activity that one of the subject which is UHAK 1012 Graduate Success Attribute where the lecturer ask us to bring old newspapers to build a tower. We were randomly divided into groups and this is quite similar to the Catapult Challenge event. Our instructions given was to make a tall tower made using newspapers and we can use other materials to stick them together such as staplers and cellophane tape. Our group decided to make the base using squares and round shapes to make it stable and using slim and long pole shape of newspaper to make it taller. Even though we did not win as the tallest tower, I still quite happy as the activity was quite interesting. In this activity, I learned that teamwork is important and planning among group members is also vital to be successful which is somehow similar to the catapult challenge. Thinking skill is also enhanced as well as I need the ability to think critically which is making a stable and tall tower and also same as the catapult.

This diagram is the newspaper tower that my group and I designed previously.

Reasoning:

            Through this event, I realise that the committee members are really doing a great job to work together and make this catapult challenge event a huge success. The organizers are trying their best to solve problems that might be faced during an event. For example, the materials that they have given are not suitable for the size of the ping pong ball, therefore they figured out a solution to change the rules and conditions a little bit by giving us an extra plastic spoon that help to proceed the designing process. I as a participant in the event felt that the event flow is quite smooth.

            Besides that, before the main event started, the organizers also gave some briefing about the history of catapult which helps us to know more about catapult. Catapult is a device used to fling objects across vast distances or over walls with only physical force. Catapult originated from ancient Greece. The earliest catapults are evolved from devices much like crossbows. Although early catapults were used to launch arrows, ancient engineers soon developed the technology to launch larger objects, such as stones. Catapult had not widely used in the military until medieval times. Therefore, this really increase my knowledge about catapult and can help better design the catapult in the competition.

            I understand that this event is trying to promote engineering spirit among the participants, but initially my intention to join this event is just to get Merit KTC in order to get hostel for the future semester. But after I joined this event, it really made me improve my Thinking skills and Adaptability where I am challenged to create something with limited resources and some rules and regulations given the short amount of time.

Reconstructing:

            In this event, I realized that I rarely use some of my knowledge in real life. If  I am able to rewind time, I will try to be more proactive and try to be more brave to approach someone that I never met before and be more sociable. I have learned from this event that it can help improve Leadership and Teamworking Skills among students as one might need to be a leader in a group and work together to discuss and finish the design of catapult. 

            Besides that, I realise that I sometimes cannot make a good decision and always accept other’s opinion without giving my own opinion. In this catapult challenge, I did not contribute much as I give my members to tie the rubber bands together with the catapult. I should be more active and give my own ideas as well instead of letting others to do all the work.

            I learned to improve my communication skills by interacting with different kinds of people that I met during this event. Even though me and my groupmates are not familiar with each other, we can understand each other slowly during the discussion process and build the teamwork if we are willing to do it.

            I also realised I do not have enough knowledge regarding this catapult. I learned a lot through this event and it help me improve some ideas about physics used in this catapult with the projectile angle, force used and many more.  

            In future, I hope I can join more of this kind of event to better improve myself. I believe that going through an event, no matter as a participant or as a committee organiser of an event, it would gain a lot experience and able to apply in future. Even though now we are in MCO period due to Covid pandemic, this kind of event with hands-on are hard to be participated. This event is a really memorable experience for me.