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In lugnet.technic, Jennifer Clark writes:
> Larry Pieniazek wrote:
>
> > The man has a point. The typical construction of an inexperienced student
> > isn't likely to hang together very well, especially if it's built using tall
> > columns of basic bricks, etc. And things that don't hang together don't
> > demonstrate mechanical principles.
>
> I sortof see this and sortof don't. If they are talking specifically about civil
> engineering then fair enough,
I sit firmly in the 'sort of don't' camp. I'm going to do a little more
work on this tonight, particularly in terms of the ways in which Meccano
models civils better than Lego (in my opinion none).
> and I suppose the fact that you can "legally" bend
> meccano parts
One of the reasons why I never liked Meccano as a child. I saw too many
friends sets with plates bent all over the place (I don't mind altering lego
parts but now I know where to get replacements, I didn't know that of
Meccano when I was small). Plus with the plates being metal I knew they
would eventually break from fatigue cracking.
> in ways not really possible with Lego could be relevant, but one
> of the reasons I always preferred Technic over Meccano (aside from the fact I
> never had Meccano) was that Technic seemed to offer far more possibilities when
> it came to making mechanisms and vehicles.
>
> Why this should be I have no idea, and I certainly haven't explored Meccano to
> any great extent, but things usually looked a bit clunky in it and for some
> reason it seemed less flexible (in terms of what you could do) than Lego. I
> could make all sorts of grotesque contraptions with huge gear trains and
> whatnots far easier with Lego, and perhaps even more importantly do it more
> quickly; things click and pop together rather than needing to be bolted on.
Very important in an educational environment.
>
> I am almost certainly biased in this (maybe my brain is just geared towards Lego
> far more than Meccano), but with all of the great Technic works on the Internet,
> for someone to dismiss it as being useless at demonstrating mechanics shows they
> haven't done their research well enough :-)
Absolutely. I agree with Jason, that this chap can't have ever seen Technic
and certainly not Dacta.
I'm going to post a draft reply letter and the URL's of some pics to back up
our case.
Psi
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Message has 1 Reply:
 | | Re: New Civil Engineer letter
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| (...) I think that would be great!!! Like I said, if you can dig out that reference to the fellow from MIT (I think his first name is Fred) and his work on idioms, that would make it even better... I am so bumming that I can't find it. It's not on (...) (25 years ago, 2-Jul-01, to lugnet.technic, lugnet.loc.uk)
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Message is in Reply To:
| | Re: New Civil Engineer letter
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| (...) I sortof see this and sortof don't. If they are talking specifically about civil engineering then fair enough, and I suppose the fact that you can "legally" bend meccano parts in ways not really possible with Lego could be relevant, but one of (...) (25 years ago, 2-Jul-01, to lugnet.technic)
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