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Design of a Thrilling Roller Coaster - Project: Design the Most Thrilling Coaster

Author(s): 
Patricia W. Hammer, Jessica A. King, and Steve Hammer

Here you will use the ideas from modules A-E to design a straight-stretch coaster that satisfies all restrictions and has the maximum possible thrill.  Completion of this project requires ingenuity, creativity, and extension/modification of many of the ideas and Maple commands presented in modules A-E. You may use trig functions or polynomial functions or both or neither.

   

Greyhound, Green Bay, WI

You should write your project report as a mini technical report, and you should include:

  • Complete explanation of the design of your coaster (why did you choose this particular design and how do you know it is the most thrilling?)
  • Complete explanation of all mathematical calculations (slopes, angles, thrills, etc.)
  • Complete Maple worksheets that show all mathematical calculations and plots.

If you have successfully completed sections A-E, you may choose to complete this project using more advanced and efficient Maple code (e.g., do loops).

Click on the icon at the right to download a sample advanced Maple worksheet.

   

Steel Dragon 2000, Nagashima, Japan

 

Patricia W. Hammer, Jessica A. King, and Steve Hammer, "Design of a Thrilling Roller Coaster - Project: Design the Most Thrilling Coaster," Convergence (February 2005)