Students building bridges to potential engineering careers on Saturday at PFW

Posted: 02/17/25

Author: Blake Sebring

Categories: Engineering and Technology

Key Info

• The 35th annual PFW Bridge Building Contest starts at 9 a.m., Saturday in the International Ballroom at Walb Student Union.
• More than 100 middle and high school individuals and teams will present their bridges built with 200 or fewer Popsicle sticks and wood glue.

The only guaranteed result at Saturday's 35th annual edition of the Purdue University Fort Wayne Bridge Building Contest is that there will be a new winner in the high school division. That's because Noah DeLong and Lucas Stevens, winners of the last four years from Homestead High School, are now attending PFW as freshman engineering majors.

More than 100 middle and high school presenters will participate from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. in the International Ballroom at Walb Student Union. Admission is free to watch, as teams and individuals build bridges consisting of no more than 200 Popsicle sticks and wood glue, and limited in height to 12 inches or less, width of six inches or less, and length of at least 24 inches.

The finished products are placed in a specialized machine to judge their construction, load, and durability under continuous pressure. The bridge with the highest failure load-to-bridge weight ratio wins.

The high school contest runs from 9 to 11 a.m., and the middle school contest starts at noon. The top three finishers in each division are recognized, and there are additional awards for balance of design, cleanness of glue, cleanness of connection, and creative/innovative structure form.

Since 2019, 42 contest participants have later attended PFW, including DeLong and Stevens, now an electrical engineering major. DeLong won last year and in 2022, with Lucas taking the title in 2023. They combined as a team to win in 2019-21, and DeLong won individually in 2018.

Building a winning bridge requires a solid understanding of the forces at play and the construction itself, DeLong said.

"We would make our bridges as light as possible by sanding off as much glue as possible," DeLong said. "We also did something that we kept secret from everyone, which was putting the bridges in the oven the morning before a competition. This helps pull moisture out of the wood and can surprisingly lighten the bridge by as much as 25%."

DeLong, now a mechanical engineering technology major, said his strongest bridge held 1,296 pounds and weighed .69 pounds. His personal favorite was the one he made last year.

"We had always thrown around the concept of laminating sticks together into a sheet and cutting the bridge out of it," DeLong said. "We basically made plywood out of Popsicle sticks and then used a 3D-printed jig to cut the trusses out with a Dremel. We were not sure how this bridge would do, but it ended up holding around 1,200 pounds and winning."

For additional information, contact Blake Sebring at [email protected]or 260-385-0092 (mobile).