TSO-A Day 6: Putting on the Final Touches

An extra screw here, a small piece of wood there, perhaps a bit a paint on this and that. Whatever minor and major changes Tinkerers could make on their last build day was made up to the final moments before revealing their mini golf course masterpieces.

Zachary, Lars, Miller and Charlie discuss possible solutions to safely operating the catapult obstacle.

Zachary, builder of a catapult, works to safely launch his creation by tethering a release pin to his construction.

“Wait, is that going to catapult to there,” Lev asks, as he points to the obstacle table below. “Y’all’s is fancy!”

Another Tinkerer asks how far the catapult can launch a golf ball.

“I actually don’t know,” Zachary says. It’s an answer works to find as he fine tunes his project.

In the juniors’ build site, the water wheel team builds stairs to ascend to the top of their platform tee, painting areas of their obstacle blue to mimic water. Mt. Certain Doom undergoes a third name change, becoming an Egyptian pyramid and theme following the painting yellow of each mountain side. Finally, the California Adventure team paints the Golden Gate Bridge a rusty red, the obstacle cars various colors and the signs denoting each California-themed piece, Escape from Alcatraz, Caltrain and so on, with bold black type.

At the seniors’ site, the windmill team adds canvas to their blades and a bucket to catch the golf ball that is caught in the adjacent cupping mechanisms, subsequently sending it down a track to the next hole. The skee golf team works until the last minutes to perfect their added hammer which will activate another ball to drop through the Plinko portion of their obstacle.

Team Skee Golf works to integrate the various mechanisms of their obstacle.

“I’m surprised any of it works,” Charlie says as he stands back to watch the ball wind through the entire obstacle.

The table team finished, as well, in the final minutes of the build time by adding more obstacles to the platform including a spring loaded, ball-popping hole. By the end of the mini golf course demonstrations, Tinkerers were excitedly moving hole to hole to try a putt or two.

Check out our photo slideshow and videos below to see how some of our Tinkerers’ creations.