Which is better, Christmas or Steel Bridge Season?

It's bridge season, so get out there, post some stupid questions to the NSSBC rules page, and catch that beautiful butterfly

*YAAAAAAWWWWWWWWWN*

While the NSSBC slept and ChromeOllie went on a nonsense-posting spree, we slept too. In our snuggies.

2012 RULES ARE HERE! NO ROLLING TEMP PIERS!

On a different note, props to the men of steel from team Citadel on the front page of the competition guide. I tip my hat to you and your tuxedos.

Just Bee-ee-ee-eee Yourself.

Lakehead Wins NSSBC 2011, eh?

Congratulations to Lakehead for the stunning victory today in College Station! And a huge congratulations to Team Georgia Tech who won 1st in Display, 3rd in Lightness, and 4th Overall! We're proud of you fellas.

Here are the FULL RESULTS

Overall:
1st - Lakehead
2nd - Michigan Tech
3rd - SUNY Canton
4th - Georgia Tech

If you attended Nationals in CSTX today and took video of bridge constructions, throw them on youtube and leave us a note or a link in the comments so those who couldn't make it can see the good stuff.

Map of Competitors

Now that we're here, I've moved the map of the all the competitors that I think are coming to CSTX to this link so that you can all still see it, but it doesn't take up all that room at the top of the page.

@csbt

Having a blast in Texas, wish you were here.

@GTFabricationClub

leaving for CSTX. lol.




This is twitter, right?

Come back to Texas, It ain't been the same since you went away

If you know what goes behind the question marks, send a comment and I'll fill them in. Some of these schools below are based on results that have turned up online and some are based on rumor. Some are also based on the work the Ernest Hemingway.

Carolinas

Georgia Institute of Technology, from Atlanta, GA

                The Citadel, from Charleston, SC

Deep South

                Louisiana Tech University, from Ruston, LA

                Arkansas State University, from Jonesboro, AK

Great Lakes

                University of Wisconsin, from Madison, WI

                Purdue University, from West Lafayette, IN
                University of Illinois at Chicago, from Chicago, IL

Metropolitan

                New Jersey Institute of Technology, from Newark, NJ

                Cooper Union, from New York, NY

Mid-Atlantic

                Lafayette College, from Easton, PA

                Drexel University, from Philadelphia, PA
                Penn State, from State College, PA

Mid-Continent

                Kansas State University, from Manhattan, KS

                ?

Mid-Pacific

                Cal Berkeley, from Berkeley, CA

                San Jose State University, from San Jose, CA

Mid-West

                Lakehead University, from Thunder Bay, Ontario, Canada
                University of Minnesota Twin Cities, from Minneapolis, MN

                Iowa State University, from Ames, IA

New England

                University of New Hampshire, from Durham, NH

                M.I.T., from Cambridge, MA

North Central

                Michigan Technological University, from Houghton, MI

                University of Michigan, from Ann Arbor, MI

Ohio Valley

                University of Akron, from Akron, OH
                Youngstown State University, from Youngstown, OH
                Geneva College, from Beaver Falls, PA

Pacific Northwest

                University of Alaska Fairbanks, from Fairbanks, AK

                University of British Columbia, from Kelowna, B.C., Canada
                Washington State University, from Pullman, WA 

Pacific Southwest

                Cal Poly, from San Luis Obispo, CA

                University of Hawaii at Manoa, from Honolulu, HI
                California State University Long Beach, from Long Beach, CA

Rocky Mountain

                South Dakota School of Mines, from Rapid City, SD

                Utah State University, from Logan, UT

Southeast

                Southern Polytechnic State University, from Marietta, GA

                University of Tennessee, from Knoxville, TN
                University of South Florida, from Tampa, FL

Texas-Mexico

                University of Texas at El Paso, from El Paso, TX
                University of Texas, from Austin, TX
                La Salle Cuernavaca, from Cuernavaca, Morelos, México

Upstate New York

                SUNY Canton, from Canton, NY

                ?

Virginias

                Catholic University of America, from Washington D.C.

               

Mid-Pac Paddy-wack, Give a Dog a Bridge

Now that school has wrapped up and we can all get back to where we belong (the machine shop), it's time to catch up on things.

Thanks to JMac for getting us the results from the Mid-Pacific Conference.


Everyone watch out for Cal Berkeley: Their lean, mean, low-deflection machine checked in at regionals at a cool 148 pounds, the lightest bridge I've seen yet. If anyone has videos from the Mid-Pac conference, throw them on the tube and let us know.

Like a good neighbor

State Farm is there: With a steel bridge.

Deep in the Heart of Texas

Registration information has been sent out for all the teams headed to Nationals in one month. Click the national competition logo to the right to get to A&M's competition host website to register and get information and the schedule.

And now for some Texas education:
Deep in the Heart of Texas
The Yellow Rose of Texas
Texas State Anthem
The Alamo
That is all.

One of these things looks just like another (update)

I still haven't found full results from this region, but did find on UMichigan's steel bridge page that they placed second overall and will be in CSTX in May. Congrats guys!

I'm posting their steel bridge construction video again because it's a great video.

And.... Boom goes the dynamite

News Team! Assemble!

Georgia Tech Steel Bridge 2011: Presented to you by the GT Fabrication Club

Conference Competition Results:

Construction Time:       9.13 minutes
Weight:                        221 pounds
Aggregate Deflection:  0.91 inches (in load case 4)
Zero to 60:                  4.6 seconds
Top Speed:                 45 mph
Total cost:                   $4,269,035

Carolinas Conference Results (on the way)

I'll post the tabulated results when they become available, but for now: Congrats to The Citadel from Team Georgia Tech! We're looking forward to traveling west to CSTX with you in a month.

In other news: Georgia Tech Steel Bridge takes First at Carolinas Conference after breaking sound barrier atop Chevy Silverado.

Caution!!!! Do not try this at home. Do not place steel bridge atop vehicle without adult supervision. 

Professional driver on a closed course.

Aqua Teen Hunger Bridge

In other news, we're also working on the steel bridge for the ASCE regional conference in North Carolina this weekend. As you can see from the picture*, we've assembled the bridge and finished painting. We are excited about our design and can't wait to meet our competition on Saturday.




*Certain details have been omitted for the protection of all involved parties.

Progress

Team Georgia Tech has been hard at work these last few weeks and results are really starting to be noticeable. As you can see we have the main arch up and the crane has arrived onsite to start hoisting the cables as soon as they arrive.









Update: First cable is up!

Red vs. Blue

I know they changed the size of the member box this year... but these members... really?

Pacific Northwest Conference Results

Here are the PNW steel bridge RESULTS.

After the FE, instead of working on our own bridge I'm going to start compiling results in a spreadsheet to compare everyone from all the conferences. Bossman, if you read this, I'm just kidding about not working on our bridge, I'll probably come in to the shop. Isn't this bridge done yet? At least it's only January and we have plenty of time to work it.

Great Lakes Conference Results

Found RESULTS the from the Great Lakes conference, which happened last weekend at the University of Wisconsin - Milwaukee.

The University of Wisconsin - Madison won with a total cost of $4,688,991.

One of these things looks just like another

Great minds think alike? I haven't found posted results for the North Central region competition that happened this past weekend.

Pacific Southwest Conference Results

Since I haven't heard of so many of these schools, I'm just going to list best stats. (but if you want it, I found the full results HERE.) And if you go look at the full results, make sure to note that UC San Diego was DQ'd for a temporary pier violation. Three teams were also disqualified for construction times (weighted or otherwise) being too long.

Overall Steel Bridge Standings:

1st - $2,913,853
     (beat the 1st place finisher in the SW conference by $395,594)

2nd - $3,257,327

3rd - $5,838,028

Weight:

1st - 173 pounds

2nd - 194 pounds

3rd - 208 pounds

Speed:

1st - 8.97 minutes

2nd - 9.82 minutes

3rd - 19.79 minutes

Aggregate Deflection:

1st - 0.166 inches (HOLY CRAP!)

2nd - 0.170 inches

3rd - 0.331 inches

Thanks to these guys for the results.

Come on down

It looks like it's about time for the construction videos to start pouring in.

How many monkeys does it take?

These guys sure did put in a lot of work. I can really tell that... zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz....

Southeast Conference Results

ASCE Tennessee Tech has posted results from the Southeast Regional Competition a couple of weekends ago. Here's a summary of the steel bridge competition, and the detailed results are HERE.

Overall Steel Bridge Standings:
1st - University of Florida, $3,309,447
2nd - Southern Polytechnic State University, $4,660,788
3rd - University of Tennessee, Knoxville, $5,137,615

Weight:
1st - Southern Poly - 176 pounds
2nd - Vanderbilt - 207 pounds
3rd - University of South Florida - 306 pounds

Speed:
1st - University of Florida - 6.6 minutes
2nd -UT Knoxville - 12.3 minutes
3rd - Southern Poly - 13.1 minutes

Aggregate Deflection:
1st - University of Miami - 0.385 inches
2nd -Vanderbilt - 0.413 inches
3rd - USF - 0.472 inches

Progress and Service

Now that competition season has begun, we've started looking for videos to pop up on youtube. This video shows a couple bridges in passing after wasting a few minutes with drive-by shots of canoes at the Deep South regional competition at Mississippis State. I like the one that looks like it weighs 2000 pounds.