Video: MSU Engineering Students Take On The First “Cowbell Challenge”

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STARKVILLE, MISS. (WCBI) – How many different ways can you ring a cowbell?

Mississippi State engineering students are exploring their creative side while ringing ingeniously.

It’s the first Cowbell Challenge and participants are show casing their unique cowbell machines.

“Ring Responsibly” is heard a lot at Mississippi State football games, but Bagley College of Engineering students are testing their knowledge to see just how many ways they can ring a cowbell in the first Cowbell Challenge.

“We’re really excited about the Mississippi State football team and we wanted to celebrate that success by having something that’s fun and involves engineering,” said Interim Dean of the Bagley College Of Engineering, Dr. Jason Keith.

Seven teams of engineering students accepted the challenge to build and design a machine that can automatically ring a cowbell with just the flip of a switch.

One group of electrical engineering students, created an app on their cell phone that operates their machine.

“And you hit a button and it connects to a small computer. it’s called a PC DUINO, wirelessly, so that we can send it commands and have it do operations on the board,” said junior electrical engineering major, Lee Harris Sargent.

There were several guideline students had to follow, including using a certain size cowbell, a plywood base and the cowbell has to ring for 15 seconds.

Some students relied on other courses to ring their cowbell.

“I was in architecture for a year, so drawing that doing straight lines, design and stuff by building stuff, I’ve done that before but nothing mechanical like this,” said graduate student, Nick Willis.

Whatever, way their bell rings it was a learning experience for the students.

“We’re all engineers, we all have our own way of wanting to do things like the best way possible and so just trying to come up with one way to so things… getting on the same page,” said Willis.

Winners in each category won a $500 cash prize and a certificate.

There was also a cash prize and certificate for the overall winning team.