Day: Bottle Rocket!

Today, we basically worked on our bottle rockets and launched on the baseball field almost all day. To be honest it was pretty frustrating for my group and I (Remi, Taylor, and I) because our rocket wasn't working out the way we had anticipated and each time a different problem would occur which made things really frustrating. However, after finishing all of our launches, I can see that it was all just a kinetic process of learning physics and we did still do OK because we got 8.5 or so seconds out of a goal of 10 seconds.

I believe many things contributed to our not being able to make our goal such as wind trouble, we could never really attain a good water to air ratio, the pumps sometimes did not work the way they should have, and the most frustrating problem with our rocket was the fact that many a time our parachute would not come out as it got stuck in our cone at the top of our rocket and the rocket would just come straight down, which took much less time than if the parachute had opened up and our rocket had floated down. Our design (I thought) was actually pretty decent.

First, we used one full liter bottle of sprite (without the sprite before, but it was not cut or anything) and we taped the top third of a liter coke bottle over the bottom end of the sprite bottle. We then filled the sprite bottle one third of the way with water and cut a trash bag into a square (double layered) and put little pieces of tape on both sides on each of the corners and put string through and double knotted it to ensure that it stayed. We then taped the other ends of the string to the bottle evenly (four strings) and we bunched up the parachute and string and lightly put it into a cone that had a weight with putty around it attached to the top of the cone. We put the cone over the top of the coke side of the rocket and shot it up! (after setting up our launcher and pumping: which was much harder than it looked...)

We made our rocket with two bottles to make it longer and therefore shoot straighter (or go the way we aimed rather than tumbling around) and we also used the one with weight so that it would go up higher and when it flipped to come down, the cone would fall off and our parachute would come out. We decided to double layer our parachute so that it would not rip and basically used it for insurance. We used duct tape because we figured that that would be the best way to keep everything attached as opposed to a weaker tape and glue which can be really tricky and even time consuming.

I thought that we did pretty well with our overall rocket although I can not say it exactly the way that we had planned or anticipated. However, I think that because of this we were able to continue to redo and recreate, replan, and reconstruct our rocket to make it the best we could (this design is the one that got us to 8.5 seconds (not aunties)) I also thought that next time, we should maybe not use putty and tape instead inside of the cone because the parachute would sometimes stick to the putty and not come out due to the putty! The parachute not coming out was a pretty big issue because we would barely reach 4 or 5 seconds without it. If we ever get a chance I really hope I will have learned enough from this experience and be able to make 10 seconds next time!

Day: 19

Today, we worked a lot on our bottle rockets which we (Remi, Taylor, and I)  spent a lot of time planning out! We decided to use one liter bottle of sprite and taped the top third of a one liter coke bottle on the top so that both ends of the rocket had a top (nozzle). We also created our parachute today using a trash bag and tying four strings to the side of them. We also decided to put a cone over it so that our rocket would go up but also the cone (in our wanted scenario) would fly off on its way down and the parachute would come out so that it would stay in the air for a longer amount of time. We also decided to add two fins which we also lined with tape (mostly to look cool but hoping that it will make it more aero dynamic!) I hope ours turns out well tomorrow so wish us luck ;)

I thought that this picture would better suit my blog post and since I wanted to save a picture of my own rocket for a surprise tomorrow night after we see our results, I decided to show you what I am trying to model my bottle rocket after although Im sure it will look much less professional and look ghetto :0

Day: 18

Today we learned more about equations and work, joules, and momentum. I was able to further expand my knowledge on the "power" of people. Today we did a lab about power and mass which we found out the relationship between the two through timing each other running up stairs and using our mass and calculated our "power". This lab finally helped me to understand the difference between power and work and I think that this was a really important thing to be able to know the difference between. We also practiced more equations. Today also really helped me to see how everything that we do really can be measured by a unit...called work! I am really excited to work on our rockets tomorrow and I hope we do well and can beat 10 seconds!!!!! Good Luck everyone! :) This turtle here is not doing any work because he is not moving in height or using any energy at all. Lazy turtle....do work!

Day: 17

Today we learned a lot of new things! We learned about energy and work! I didn't know that there was such thing as work besides the one referring to occupation. We also learned about joules (pronounced jewels) and we even learned about Hooke's law and learned a lot of new equations! (looks like things are getting trickier) We also learned that "the energy that an object has due to it's position in a gravitational field is a product of mass x gravity x height. We also learned a lot of springs and I am excited to finish our lab on Monday! It was pretty interesting to learn about work, energy, and joules and I'm ready to learn about more!! And yupp, the picture is my necklace with jewels since we talked about joules! ...not too great of a pun in know ;(

Egg Drop!

GUESS WHAT!? Our egg surprisingly lived!! We were really happy because like many other egg drops, we were really gambling on it not landing on the open side (with only tape to hold the sponges and egg in). Luck was on our side though and it landed on the side of the box which created a lot of friction when it landed which helped the force to not be so sudden on the egg (otherwise it would have broken really easily). Our plan/layout for our capsule was that we used very light supplies so that our contraption would reach terminal velocity faster (as compared to a heavier contraption). However, we still needed our capsule to be durable so that it did not break (including our egg) from the impact. Our contraption was to wrap the egg in bubble wrap first, then in sponge to increase the contact time. We then put that into a box of styrofoam in order to hopefully absorb most of the shock! We placed the sponge in the middle of the box so that no matter which side (except for the opening which was only covered with a cross of tap to keep the sponge (including bubble wrap and the egg inside) it lands on, the sponge will have more time before it hits the side. The sponge would also have friction to slow it down which creates more contact time. I believe that the one thing that would have probably been a better idea was to cut a styrofoam top out to cover our open side because there was a chance that the box would land on the side that was not protected by any styrofoam which would have resulted in a dead egg :( Good thing we were lucky!

Day: 15

I can't believe we are already halfway through physics and can't believe that we have today off! It's a great treat for 4th of July! Don't forget to wear red blue and white and get in the spirit! (hence the picture) I also found that picture a while back so I can't find the link although I tried looking for it... But yesterday we learned a lot about momentum which we also learned actually has a lot to do with crashing (such as cars) and coincidentally, explosions. Tonight, I am looking forward to watching the fireworks and I will undoubtedly be thinking about those sUpArFuN equations and I am yet still surprised to see just how much physics has to do with everyday things that we just accepted and never really thought about for over a decade and a half of our lives! Crazy

Day: 14

Today was the first day of a new semester! It was pretty challenging as we began to learn about a new unit, momentum! Our lab today with the balloons was pretty fun and really helped me to see how impact of an activity as simple as throwing a water balloon has a significant and direct relationship to physics, and more specifically, momentum! I thought that this picture was pretty funny and (yes another jumping picture!) that this really can put impulse, momentum, mass, velocity, and impact. I am really interested to see how the egg drop turns out and hope to learn more about momentum and hope to get better at the equations as well!