[Gadget470]

Please all:

Do not turn this thread into an Engineer vs College vs High School debate.

That has been debated enough.
The two sides of the argument are:
HS Built) Kids learn more by doing.
Eng Built) Kids learn more by seeing things done "right".

Neither can be proven either way. Each individual is different. I've been a student on two teams. One which was 90% "Adult" designed/built, and the other which was 90% "HS Student" designed/built. I won't say which I learned more from because I am a unique person with a unique experience.

As to that specific sprocket, two retro words:
Way Cool.

I'm pretty sure Tytus designed this, as he states he drew the "Eyes" in AutoCAD "last night" from the post date. To my knowledge, Tytus is a high school senior with CAD experience. The piece was cut with a water-jet at BTI (One of 179's sponsors). So your comment about the engineer built product is irrelevent. The water-jet machine (seemingly) loads the AutoCAD file, and makes its cuts where lines are in the drawing file.

1) Was this water-jet cut piece necessary?
2) Does it look really cool?
3) Could they buy an off-the-shelf item that does the same function?
4) If so, does it really matter who manufactures the product?

1) No.
2) Yes.
3) Yes.
4) No.