The Rube Goldberg machine set to com­pete at Nationals. Photo Courtesy Kyle Hebner

The national Rube Goldberg com­pe­ti­tion was held at Purdue University  where Ferris’ team com­peted, falling short of win­ning an award.

The task of the machine at this year’s com­pe­ti­tion, which took place the week­end of March 27, was to squeeze hand san­i­tizer from a bot­tle into a hand. There were 12 uni­ver­si­ties in atten­dance, along with 13 high schools that com­peted in a sep­a­rate competition.

The Ferris team trav­eled to Japan in January to cre­ate a machine in an attempt to re-break the world record. Kyle Hebner, a Ferris senior and Rube Goldberg team mem­ber, said that between the Japan trip and school, it was an accom­plish­ment to even get a machine together for the national competition.

“Between trav­el­ing to Japan and build­ing a machine over there and work­ing on our respec­tive senior design projects, it’s a won­der we made it down there at all,” said Hebner.

Hebner said that there were some very impres­sive machines at the com­pe­ti­tion. He said a few of judges felt over­whelmed with the amount of machines they had to look over.

“We all agreed before the com­pe­ti­tion that no mat­ter what hap­pened, we were going to have fun.  I couldn’t ask for a bet­ter group of guys to be holed up in a lab for hours on end with,” said Hebner. “I think the com­pe­ti­tion went well…I had a lot of fun.”