USC Mechanical Engineering students have been set an interesting stone-age challenge of creating the best ‘Flintstones-era’ putting machine.

As part of their university assessment, teams of students were asked to build machines capable of sinking five balls on a putting green, using only balsa wood, wood cement, a base board and string.

They will display their machines in a ‘putt-off’ on campus at Sippy Downs at noon on Friday 20 October.

The contest will be followed by an exhibition of Mechanical Engineering student projects from 2-4pm at USC’s Visualisation Studio, featuring a ‘tear-down’ of two-stroke engines, perspective drawings of aircraft, polyhedral shape designs and technology-inspired mirror frames.

USC Associate Professor of Mechanical Engineering Dr Selvan Pather said students received a project brief and rudimentary materials to design, build and operate a simple machine to be used by their hypothetical client, Fred Flintstone.

“It’s a task that requires a lot of creativity, as well as the technical skills and knowledge they’ve learnt in their Mechanical Design courses at USC,” he said. “They’ll have 10 minutes to sink the balls, and the machines can only be operated by pulling on strings.

“We’ll also have a range of other fantastic student work, including the perspective drawings of aircraft that the students undertook following a scoping visit to the Queensland Air Museum.”

— Gen Kennedy