Easter STEM Challenge - Transport an egg down the zip wire

Our next Easter STEM challenge is to build a harness to safely transport a small egg down a zip wire. Once you’ve built a suitable harness for a chocolate egg, you could try a real egg ( maybe boil it first ) and test to see if the harness works for that as well.

We’ve got plenty of other Easter STEM Challenges to keep you busy too including eggy toothpick towers, magnet-powered egg cars and lots more easy STEM for kids.

Chocolate EGG STEM Challenge

Zip wire for an egg. Image shows a string suspended outdoors with a chocolate egg attached with a pipe cleaner harness

What you’ll need to make an egg zip wire

String, wire or wool

Pipe cleaners and straws

Plastic eggs/chocolate eggs/eggs

Timer

Egg Zip Line Method

This is another great activity for learning about setting up an investigation as a fair test.

Easter Zip Wire - fun STEM Challenge for kids. Creme egg being transported down a zip wire in a small plastic egg

Easter STEM Challenge – variables

Type of zip wire

The incline of the zip wire

Weight of egg

Type of harness

To test one variable, all the others must remain the same each time you test. For example, to investigate whether the weight of the egg changes how long it takes to travel down the zip wire, keep the type of wire, incline and harness exactly the same and change ONLY the weight of the egg. We usually repeat each test 3 times and calculate the average time.

Once you’ve identified the variables, choose one to test. If you want to investigate how the material the zip wire is made from affects the speed the egg travels down the wire, you’ll need to use the same harness, same egg and have the zip wire at the same incline when you test each type of zip wire.

Things to think about

Friction – we found our egg took longer to travel down a zip wire made with rough string than smooth wire, this is because there was more friction between the rough string and harness than smooth string and harness.

Instructions for an egg zip line STEM challenge

More Easter STEM Challenges

Try a harness made using a segment of straw running over the zip wire. The inside of a straw is smooth meaning there shouldn’t be much friction between the straw and the wire.

EASTER STEM Challenge - string used to make a zip wire for a chocolate egg #Scienceforkids

More Friction Investigations

Try this easy slipping and sliding activity as a simple introduction to the concept of friction.

Try these easy force investigations including friction, air resistance and gravity.

More Easter Experiments for Kids

As well as Easter experiments we’ve also got some fun eggy experiments for kids too!

Buy our NEW book!

Did you know I have several science books available? Rocket Science is full of easy and exciting space-themed activities perfect for kids of all ages, and Snackable Science has 60 exciting edible tests and experiments.