Students
Good ride, cowboy by Missy Nilan, Oakland, Iowa
A cowboy nods his head, the chute gate opens and a bucking horse lunges into the arena, trying his best to buck off the cowboy. With each jump, kick and belly roll of the bucking horse, the cowboy responds ... or falls. Oklahoma State University Cowboys Luke Reed, Kyle Stein and Patrick Sievert began the 2004 fall semester - their senior year in agricultural engineering - working to help prepare cowboys for riding. All OSU biosystems agricultural engineering seniors are introduced to their year-long senior capstone project, BAE 4012 and BAE 4022 Biosystems and Agricultural Engineering Capstone, at the beg~ing of the fall semester and complete the project with a presentation at the end of the following spring semester. Reed,
Bill Beaty, owner of Rockin' B Bucking Machines, gave students advice throughout the project. (photo by Missy Nilan)
22 • Cowboy Journal
Stein and Sievert had a unique project: design and build a bucking horse machine. "I am always looking for interestOSU students observed horses to find the course of action ing, real-world projto achieve the same motions given by a real bucking horse. ects for students to (photo by Missy Nilan) work on," said Paul Weckler, assistant professor in the sional rodeo cowboys who compete OSU Department of Biosystems and in the rough stock events of bareback Agricultural Engineering. riding and saddle bronc riding. Rockin' B Bucking Machines are The Oklahoma Alliance for Manufacturing Excellence and the Oklaknown for their mechanical bucking homa Center for the Advancement of bull machines. Ty Murray, sevenScience and Technology make projtime World All-Around Champion ects accessible to students through the Cowboy, endorses their machines. Celebrities, including Madonna and Application Engineers Program. The program works with small manufacBrooks and Dunn, own bucking bull turers in rural areas of Oklahoma to machines. The machines have been help provide engineering assistance. seen in one of Madonna's music vidKnowing that, Paul Walenciak, eos, as well as on her concert tours. manufacturing extension agent for Currently, their bucking bull mathe Oklahoma Alliance for Manufacchines can be found at fairs, rodeos turing Excellence, came across a comand bars where vendors sell rides on pany with an idea, one he was sure the machine. "I want to broaden our market would interest Weckler. more to rodeo cowboys," Beaty said. When professional rodeo cowThe Idea Rockin' B Bucking Machines is a boys told Beaty they wanted a bucksmall company in Cheyenne, Okla., ing machine with the movements of a bucking horse rather than a buckwhose mechanical bucking bulls have worldwide recognition. ing bull, he decided he would accept "We market to 10 or 12 different their challenge. countries and to every state," said Bill Beaty, owner and president of Rockin' The Project B Bucking Machines. After the students received their Beaty's initial idea was to build a project assignment, they visited with mechanical bucking horse for profesBeaty, collecting research and draw-