To make a stacked penny bridge, you must have more than one column. In this case I am starting off with two columns stacked ten pennies high. I used three pennies to space the columns out to the correct distance apart. This will allow the pennies on top of the bridge to have the correct space to be stacked.

Next I stack pennies on top of each column the same way I did in part 1.

I continue to stack these pennies so there is enough weight for when I start to add the pennies to create the bridge to span from one column to the other.

I added pennies on either side of the stack. I needed to add the same number of pennies to either side of each column so each stack would remain balanced.

This step is probably the hardest part of the whole bridge. I had to add the two middle pennies without knocking the whole thing over. These two pennies will touch and will carry the penny that will join the two columns. To do this, I held the penny at the very to of one column and slid the penny into place. Then I did the same to the opposite column, being extremely careful not to knock over either column.

Noticing that the columns needed extra weight to help keep them sturdy, I added more pennies to the top of each column. Then I carefully added two more pennies that would hold the top of the joining penny. These were as challenging as the two pennies in the previous step.

I was then able to slide the joining penny between the four pennies I placed in the previous two steps. I almost lost the whole bridge at this point so be careful.

At this point the rest of the bridge is pretty easy. I just started to stack more pennies.

I kept stacking and stacking. I was amazed at how strong the bridge was once I got above two or three layers.

I was so impressed with its strength that I started to stack more weight on top. That is 22 more pennies on top of that bridge. The bridge didn’t even budge.

I added another stack of 22 coins right next to the first stack. The bridge would have held easily, but by this point the whole structure was off center and the whole thing came crashing down. Oh well.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, May 8th, 2007 at 2:44 pm and is filed under Stack Pennies. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.