Rat Trap Car

This project was inspired by LarrySDonald's Mouse Trap Car. I give him full credit for the idea. Anyway, this is a very similar thing except with a twist. My car is made with a rat trap instead of a mouse trap. I had some knex lying around and I thought that they could make great wheels and axles. This car goes pretty far and fast so be careful. You also need to be careful of the rat trap because it is on a hair trigger and can release at any moment. I take no responsibility of damage to any property, body parts or animals hehe. Make sure nobody is in the path of the car when it is being launched.


Let's get started!

Step 1 Gather Materials

To build the Rat Trap Car you will need the following:

Parts

1-rat trap
4-eye hooks
10 inches of fishing line

Knex

4-large knex wheels
4-grey connectors
4-tan connectors
2-red length rods

Tools

Drill
Scissors
Lighter
Drill bits
-1/16
-5/64

Comments

[CraZeD MuSiCiaN]

Does this design get both distance AND speed??? or does it just get one or the other? o.0

[goldfishisback]

man this was so simple yet really well written, thanks heaps and keep writing :D

[sevndedlysinz]

fA__G...g!ott
succk upp

[CraZeD MuSiCiaN]

hahaha that made me smile

[CraZeD MuSiCiaN]

MAGIC BANANAS! :D

[eestrada11]

where did you get the knex items from??

[StarkIndustries]

Knex sets. Derp.

[josh2k]

how can you calculate the force of the spring?? or the force that the car is released

[liltheo25]

cool

[james.mcglashan]

throw a  rat at it to start it hehe.

[pindalanderz]

I've found it to work even better if you use a broken rubber band instead of a string.

[geodez]

i have a lot of broken rubber bands

[pindalanderz]

sweet!!!!

[geodez]

that really depends on your point of view, all of the rubber bands that i need whole are broken

[geodez]

not a rat trap car, call it a rat rod

[kelseyyyyy]

where do you find knex wheels?

[Tmbo17932]

www.ebay.com

[yannyboy]

ebay

[cjgirl]

how far did this go

[gamefreek]

HAHAHAHAHAHAH I CANT STOP HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA ok hehe thats so cool HAHAHAH

[cartmanblues]

Does it go like 10m? That's how far mine has to go for a class.

[harrycarter]

(removed by author or community request)

[harrycarter]

(removed by author or community request)

[bakenbitz]

What do you need help with?

[pinkpooj]

I just posted a design for a window shade car. Check it out! Pull down window shades give the car a lot more torque and distance than mouse traps because the torque spring is several inches long.

[bitesnkisses]

awesome, how far does this go?

[bakenbitz]

30 feet or so. Why did you comment twice?

[bitesnkisses]

sorry, my internet crashed and i thought it hadn't sent it >.<

[bitesnkisses]

this looks nice? how far did it go?

[BuangAyam]

Nice work, you really do it great. maybe I'll try to make one too. But, I'll try to make mine with some car parts to make it look like a true car and some art and modification. So the rat will surely be inside and really trapped.

[bakenbitz]

Stop advertising.

[I_am_Canadian]

ya.

[tecno geek]

why does it say tape here
p.s. click here and tell me what you think: http://www.instructables.com/tag/?q=tecno+geek&limit%3Atype%3Aid=on&type%3Aid=on&type%3Auser=on&type%3Acomment=on&type%3Agroup=on&type%3AforumTopic=on&sort=none

[thepaul1993]

cool you should find out how fast it goes

[proffesor cuddles]

zeeky zeeky bomb!

[thepaul1993]

yeh

[A_squared]

very good i made one in grade eight. Best in class of course : )

[proffesor cuddles]

I made one w/ a mousetrap in my 7th grade tech ed class I cant wait to make one with the all-powerful rat trap!

[dannosliwcd]

I remember when I was assigned to make a mousetrap car a few years ago. One group used a rat trap and knex and got an A. My group got a B because we followed the rubric Our fault I guess. That teacher never really seemed to grade on any specific standards.

[Hyper_hurdler3]

Thanks soo much! =D
lots of help!
fo sho!
ha!