How this is scored
Five stages of the engineering design process, plus one separate score for the copy your pantograph draws. Communicate is your team's presentation: 4 minutes or less, about your own solution, with your accuracy report.
Two kinds of score
Stages 1 through 4 are team scores. They judge shared work: your research, sketches, joint choice and measurements, the scale math, your Onshape model, your fit tests, and your versions. Both partners get the same number.
Stage 5 is yours alone. Same presentation, individual scores. Two partners can get different Communicate scores.
Where the evidence comes from. Stages 1 through 4 are scored from your notebook and Classroom photos. If it isn't in there, it can't be scored.
How this matches the six-step process. Pick a Solution is scored inside Research and Brainstorm. Test and Evaluate is scored as Iterate.
Your daily work — safety, cleanup, effort, organization — isn't scored here at all. That lives in the daily standards.
Define the Problem
Do you understand what Larkfield asked for?
Restates the client's ask in your own words. Names every rule: one hand on the stylus and nothing else touching it, fastened to the rig at one pivot, 3× bigger, trace in Trace Here and land in Draw Here, 1/8 in plywood, links no longer than 18 in or wider than 1/2 in, joints of your choice, a stylus that rides in the insert's grooves, a pencil holder, no touching the pencil, an accuracy report. Says which rule limits your design most, and why. Explains how the copy is measured (average error 5% or less) and what that means for the design.
Repeats the brief accurately but without interpretation. Rules are listed, not weighed. How the copy is measured is missing or vague.
The problem is stated vaguely or incorrectly. Rules are missing. No clear idea of what the pantograph has to do.
Research and Brainstorm
Did you explore layouts and joints, measure, check the math, and pick for a reason?
How pantographs work, researched with sources. At least two joint methods compared, and one picked with reasons. The parts you picked, the wood, the pencil, and the insert's grooves measured with calipers, with 5 samples of each joint part and their smallest, biggest, and average. Several layouts sketched by hand, each with a plan for the stylus, the pencil holder, and how it fastens to the rig. The chosen one passes the scale check with the work shown: pivot, tracer, and pencil in one line, pencil 3× as far out. The pivot hole is picked with the math for where the copy lands, and the reach is checked. The choice is made by comparing ideas, not by gut feeling.
A few ideas, but thin research. Only one joint method considered. Some measurements or checks are missing, or one sample measured instead of several. The choice is explained as a preference.
One idea, copied or guessed. Nothing measured. No checks. No reason for the choice.
Prototype
Does the math become parts that fit?
Every link modeled in Onshape. Hole spacing is set with variables and matches the scale check, measured hole center to hole center. Hole sizes come from your measured range of joint parts and a fit test cut: clearance where a link turns. Joint lengths match the stack at each joint. The stylus is sized from the measured groove and held tight at T. The pencil holder keeps the point on the paper with nobody touching it. Both are designed, not improvised. It fastens to the rig and runs with one hand. Laser cut and assembled. Onshape screenshots and build photos are in your notebook and Classroom.
A working model with gaps: spacing measured from the link ends, hole sizes guessed instead of tested, a stylus or pencil holder added after the fact, or a second hand needed to hold it down.
A basic model or none. Parts cut by trial and error.
Iterate
Did you test, measure, and change things for a reason?
A change-tracking entry for every version: a photo, a test tracing with its average percent error, what failed, your guess at the cause written before the fix, and the change with numbers. The fit test cut is recorded. Includes at least one change that didn't work and what it taught you.
The major versions are recorded, but some changes lack a reason, numbers, or a measured error. Only the changes that worked are reported.
Little evidence of iteration. A photo of the final pantograph and not much else.
Skips the challenge and the brief, and tells your team's own story. Shows all four: brainstorms, Onshape screenshots, prototypes, and the accuracy report (the copy, 6 or more measurements, each percent error, the average, and the worst). Explains why your linkage makes the copy 3×, why you chose your joints and fits, and what caused your biggest error, using your own numbers. Answers a question about a part you didn't personally design. Done in 4 minutes or less.
Covers your solution, but one of the four is missing, the accuracy report has only one or two measurements, the reasons are general ("it just works"), or time goes to retelling the challenge. Runs over 4 minutes.
Mostly describes the challenge or the brief instead of your solution. Can't explain how your pantograph scales, or hands questions to a partner.
What "explains with numbers" looks like
This is the line between a 3 and a 5 on Communicate, so here it is out loud.
A 3: "Our first one was wobbly, so we made the holes smaller and it worked better."
A 5: "We picked printed bushings over bare bolts because the wood wore out on the threads. We measured five: 6.92 to 7.08 mm. On our fit strip, the hole that turned with no wobble on the biggest one was 7.2 mm. Version 1 used 7.4 and the copy came out wavy — play at the stylus shows up 3× in the copy. Version 2 used 7.2. We measured six features on the copy. Average error 1.1%, worst 1.8%, and both of the worst were up-and-down measurements, so we think the pivot clamp still lets it rock."
The copy is scored too
Separate from the five stages, the pantograph gets its own team score on test day. A beautifully documented pantograph that draws the wrong size still scores well above — but not here.
Draws 3×
Fasten it down, trace the test shapes with one hand, measure the copy.
The whole copy lands inside Draw Here, and the average percent error across your measurements is 5% or less. Fastened to the rig, run with one hand on the stylus, without touching the pencil. Meets every rule on the overview.
The copy lands inside Draw Here, but the average error is more than 5%.
The copy doesn't land inside Draw Here, or the pantograph doesn't work with one hand.