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If I recall correctly, one of the teams at nationals last year that got their car right on the target ended up getting ~10th place because it wasn't really optimized/constructed as well as it could have been, while most of the teams who medaled were 3cm+ off the target.

If you are using a ramp, is the entire vehicle considered the falling mass?

Yup. Anything that falls to move the vehicle is the mass.

But you must find out a way to put the egg at the end of the ramp. It's also possible that the proctor won't allow it.

jacobxc wrote:But you must find out a way to put the egg at the end of the ramp. It's also possible that the proctor won't allow it.

Why at the end of the ramp?

In the rules it states that the egg must start at the starting line, so the vehicle has to be as long as the ramp, basically. This does mean that your center of gravity is not at the highest point (as it could be with a different launcher) and you loose speed with a ramp.

iwonder wrote:In the rules it states that the egg must start at the starting line, so the vehicle has to be as long as the ramp, basically. This does mean that your center of gravity is not at the highest point (as it could be with a different launcher) and you loose speed with a ramp.

So will a ramp definitely have a slower speed?

To an extent.

Your speed is based on the starting height of your center of gravity of the mass(basically, the balance point of your mass). The higher that is, the more potential energy you have, the more kinetic energy you can generate, which typically means faster (unless your vehicles are different weights)

For a ramp, the vehicle has to reach from the top of the ramp to the bottom, so if you weight down the back end, the center of gravity may be 2/3 of the way up, about 66cm. If you use a falling mass and the same weight of vehicle, the mass can be really high, say, 98cm, which translates to faster.

Also good to note, if your vehicle weighs more, but the falling mass is the same, your vehicle will go slower. Good to keep your vehicle as light as possible. It's all good reasons to seperate the vehicle and falling mass.

So has it been clarified by the Science Olympiad people that ramps are legal. Because I can see how a proctor would not allow them. Since it states it is powered by a "falling mass" and when you think of a ramp you don't think of fall object.

I submitted a clarification the day of the cyfalls contest but haven't heard back yet.