Scheming with Dale

Monday afternoon, Tyler walked into detention with Eric as his wingman.

Emmett sat forward, but I held my hand up. "Tyler, welcome to detention."

Tyler grinned and nodded toward Eric, "Mr. Cullen, he needs detention, too."

I cocked my head and studied him for a moment. "Eric, I saw you talking back to my uncle on Saturday. You've got some guts. Consider yourself in detention."

Jasper and Alice headed to the back, where he dropped magazines on her desk before sliding into his. Jasper's eyes narrowed on the two science geeks on the front row as he pulled out his graphite pencil.

I clapped my hands and said, "Okay, let's start. We are all here to get Dale flying. Emmett, I gotta say what you and the JV and Varsity teams have accomplished in PR is phenomenal."

Emmett leaned his desk forward on its front two legs and said, "Aw, thanks, Mr. C. Rosie's uncle said with what they made at the game, he should be able to get a second printing out before the weekend. Rosie said they'll have a booth set up near 'The Great Pumpkin' on Friday and Saturday nights."

"That sounds great." I turned my attention to the back of the room, "Jasper, I want to thank you again for the fantastic art of Dale. Your drawings have put all of this in motion," I said.

Jasper's pencil stilled on his desk as he looked up and met my eye. He nodded before dropping his head, and his pencil continued its work.

"And now I want to hand the floor to our newest member of detention, Tyler Crowley."

Tyler's eyes bulged before he swallowed thickly and slid out from his desk to face the room.

"Uh, thank you, sir," Tyler said, shifting on his feet with a nod. "Hi, Emmett McCarty and Jasper Whitlock," his voice softened, and he added, "Hi Alice."

She waved to him as I slid into a desk. I could see Jasper was working on a flaming pumpkin with fire-like claws and noticed he took Alice's hand as I retrained my eyes to the front giving Tyler my full attention.

Tyler slicked his bangs to the side and, with a deep breath, said, "Okay, we're all here for Dale, to see the Fling King finally take his throne."

Eric's squeak came from the corner, and Tyler pressed forward. "Saturday, the Mathletes and Robotics clubs made reference marks on the skin of Dale using grease pencils so that we could easily determine Dale's orientation in space."

Emmett's hand shot up as he leaned his desk forward. "I don't get it. Dale's not going into space. You'd need like a rocket, right?" He shot his eyes around the room, landing on me.

"Yes, um, Tyler means the space around him. Does that make sense?"

Emmett sat back and waved Tyler on before crossing his arms over his chest.

"Okay, uh, with a special camera and software, we modeled the shape using photogrammetry and created a Wavefront object."

I saw Jasper drop his pencil on his desk from the corner of my eye and sit up as Emmett raised his hand again.

"They took pictures and loaded them onto software," I interpreted and motioned for Tyler to continue.

"Using the Wavefront object, we built a CAD model and then used that model to build bottom, side, and back supports out of wood, dense foam, and glue. We used a scale under each corner of each panel to determine the center of gravity for Dale."

Emmett raised his hand, but I just shook my head and motioned for Tyler to continue.

"Um, we subtracted the pallet and panel weight and determined the total weight and the location of the center of gravity. "This is as far as we've gotten, but I'll have another update soon."

"Why don't we meet with Carlisle and Marcus on Thursday to mark your progress?" I said.

Tyler cut his eyes over to Eric, who squeaked with wide eyes. Tyler looked back at me and nodded. "We'll be there."

On my lunch break Tuesday, I walked past the sunny quad and spied Jasper and Alice eating at the science geeks' table. Alice nibbled a corner of her sandwich while Jasper huddled with Tyler, Eric, and a few others over laptops and exhausted spiral notebooks.

~o0o~

Thursday, Carlisle told the geek squad to meet out at Marcus' to see how far they'd gotten and make plans for the weekend.

An old green cargo van showed up on time and spilled ten kids into the barnyard.

Eric and two others set up a PowerPoint presentation on the barn wall as the rest set up prototypes of slings.

"Good afternoon, sirs," Tyler said as he slightly bowed to Carlisle and Marcus."

Marcus nudged Carlisle and said, "Can we keep him?"

Carlisle grinned but stepped forward and said, "Okay boys, what ya' got for us?"

Eric determinedly kept his head down but flipped a switch splashing a square of light across the barn wall, which cued Tyler to begin.

"Okay," he said and pressed the clicker to bring up schematics, "On Saturday, with a special camera and software, we modeled the shape of Dale and created a Wavefront object. With that, we could build a CAD model and use that to build bottom, side, and back supports Dale's pallet to determine Dale's center of gravity."

Carlisle leaned forward, studying the schematics on the wall. "So, where are you now?"

Tyler slicked his bangs to the side, clicked again, and said, "Well, we designed a scale model to 3D print with a large metal sphere located to give it the appropriate CG." He looked up and added, "That means the center of gravity."

Carlisle nodded and waved Tyler to continue, and Tyler took a deep breath and continued, "We were able to run the Wavefront object through Slic3r software, creating two halves of a solid 3D print model. We placed the metal sphere and then glued it together."

Tyler fumbled with the clicker until a colorful model of the trebuchet appeared on the barn wall. "We modeled the basic geometry of the trebuchet in our CAD software and used that and our CAD model of Dale to determine the best way to orient and support Dale for launch and optimum flight."

One last picture splashed across the wall as Tyler concluded, "We built a scaled-down sling to support and orient our replica of Dale optimally and then tested our concept in the robotics club lab using hardware to simulate the trebuchet and the projectile."

Marcus squirmed in his seat and nudged Carlisle.

Carlisle nodded and said, "Give it to us in English, Tyler."

"Oh, um, well, in laymen's terms, we took a bunch of pictures to make a computer model. We had the computer model tell us how best to fly Dale, and we made a scale model so that we could design a sling and test the fling."

Marcus squeezed my shoulder. "Test the fling—I like that."

I pulled away from Marcus' vice grip and said, "So what are your conclusions—Eric?"

Eric jumped with a squeak at his name, and his eyes shot to Carlisle, who nodded for him to stand.

Eric stepped beside Tyler and pushed up his glasses before saying, "Well, sirs, we tested a few different models until we had one made of a material we could scale up to Dale's size.

"We built the sling you see here. When positioned with Dale, all you'd have to do is connect the sling to the trebuchet and fling it."

We all stared at the picture of smiling giants dwarfing a small tabletop trebuchet until Tyler patted Eric's shoulder and pointed to the sling closest to us. "This is the sling we think worked optimally, sir. It is sturdy in its support and gives Dale range in the air creating the optimal arc for distance."

Carlisle and Marcus circled the sling handling it, and thinking, Marcus said, "What do you think, Carl."

Carlisle stood in thought for a moment before pinning Tyler with his eyes. "This is what we've been missing."

Tyler and the gang sagged with relief. "Thank you, sir."

Carlisle approached, and several of the gang stepped back, but Tyler and Eric stood firm. "I have some questions, and I'd like to see the footage of your test throws. You did record them?"

Eric looked insulted, but Tyler nodded. "Yes, sir, we were diligent to document and follow our process with checks and balances in place."

Marcus shifted his feet, but Carlisle threw his arm over his friends' shoulders to still him. "Okay, let's go in the house and look at that footage, and I assume you have a bill for the resources you used."

"Oh, uh, well, we were going to use this for our regional science project in the spring," Tyler said as the group nodded. "If you don't mind, sirs," Tyler added quickly.

Carlisle clapped Tyler's shoulder, causing him to flinch. "Get me the bill, and I'll sponsor your project. Fantastic work. Follow me." He said and led the flock with their captured leader under his wing.