Engineering Quiz

[Iceaxe]

Question: A Backhoe weighing 8 tons is on top of a flatbed trailer and heading east on Interstate 70 near Hays, Kansas.? The extended shovel arm is made of hardened refined steel and the approaching overpass is made of commercial-grade concrete, reinforced with 1- 1/2 inch steel rebar spaced at 6 inch intervals in a crisscross pattern layered at 1 foot vertical spacing.

Solve: When the shovel arm hits the overpass, how fast do you have to be going to slice the bridge in half?? (Assume no effect for headwind and no braking by the driver....)

Extra Credit: Solve for the time and distance required for the entire rig to come to a complete stop after hitting the overpass at the speed calculated above?

:popcorn:

[Iceaxe]

Answer: Who cares, the trucking company just bought themselves a bridge.

[Sombeech]

:roflol:

What was the make of the Backhoe? Somebody had to have taken a picture of this.

I'll answer with another question. How long did it take the driver to blame the person who loaded the backhoe?

[Scott Card]

Ohhh man. Sombody had a bad day. I had a client who did this once but to a much lesser extent (took a chunck out of an over pass, that is all). He was a wee tad drunk. That was his excuse.

[jumar]

:roflol:

Smaller version of this happened in AF a few weeks ago by my work. Looked like a motor home that didn't clear the overpass. :nod:

[epek]

Answer, faster than this one was going, but it is a trick question, in order to slice the bridge in half, it would not be stopped as infered in the extra credit question. I think this is an excellent advertisement for this brand of back hoe.

[accadacca]

Apparently it needed about 6 more feet. :haha:

[Cirrus2000]

F*** me, it's a Hyundai. I guess they make better heavy equipment than cars.


Man in automotive supply store: "I'd like a gas cap for my Hyundai Pony."
Workin' dude: "Sounds fair to me."

I like the fact that the cab SLAMMED the underside of the overpass, making a huge divot, but the cab looks fine. Operator would be well protected.

[JP]

There's a big difference between a backhoe and an excavator :roflol: