Resource: Ten Fun Facts About Engineering

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You may think of engineers as the men and women who build tall buildings and keep electrical generators operating — serious occupations that address society's needs. And you'd be right. However, society also has a need for recreation. As you'll learn from the following, engineers play an important role in how we relax and enjoy ourselves.

Water slides
Did you know that without engineers, we wouldn't have water slides? Engineers apply their understanding of physics to just about every component of a slide, from the water pumping system that pushes water to the top of a slide, to the regulation of the water to allow just the right amount to flow down, to the design and materials used in building the slide itself.

Different slide designs reflect the degree to which the friction between the rider's body and the slide resists gravity. Together, the amount of water that streams down the slide and the slope of the slide determine whether a ride will be fast or slow. On speed slides, riders plummet down a steep slope. Resistance created by the weight of a rider's body on the slide is intentionally reduced. In contrast, a spiraling slide has a shallower slope and curves, which act together to inhibit downward acceleration. This slide structure works against the force of gravity and the inertia of the falling body, resulting in a slower ride.

Snowboarding
Anyone who has either tried snowboarding or watched a half-pipe competition on television knows that it is an extreme sport — a sport, it turns out, with strong ties to engineering. Sherman Poppen, one of three people credited with the snowboard's invention, was an engineer. In the mid-1960s, Poppen bolted two skis together and attached a rope for balance and steering so his daughter could ride down a hill standing up.

Flash forward to today: From its camber (arch) shape, to its sidecut that gives the board its hourglass shape and aids in turning, to its material composition (bonded layers of fiberglass, wood, epoxy, and plastics), modern snowboards have an engineer's fingerprints all over them.

One last fun fact: A snowboard doesn't actually slide on snow. Rather, the friction of the board's nose as it encounters frozen water particles heats the snow into water, and the board glides over this thin film of water. Knowing this, product engineers must design the undersides of snowboards to ride on a surface that rapidly changes state.

To learn more about the different fields in which engineers work, check out Engineering Career Options.

To learn how our daily lives would be different were it not for engineering, check out What If Engineering Disappeared for a Day?.

To see what kinds of fun and work-saving innovations aspiring engineers have developed, check out Young Inventors.

Print Questions for Discussion

• What do all these examples have in common? For example, did science play a role in the engineering design?
• Now it's your turn. Research two more fun facts about engineering to add to this list.
• Name or list at least three things that engineers have designed that make your life more enjoyable.
• What can you think of that doesn't exist now but that would be beneficial if it were built?