MISSION TO MARS GROUP LABS

Today I did labs with my entire group. 3 were the communicators, 2 were the robotix experts, 1 was the parachute designer, 1 was the balloon lift off designer, and 1 was the parachuter. I was supposed to design the amount of weight needed to drop on a see-saw to launch an object parallel to the ground 15 feet. This experiment ultimately relates to Newton's 3rd Law because the action was the dropping of a 575 gram bag of popcorn kernels on a see-saw, the reaction was the see-saw changing weights (side with popcorn kernels going down), and the other reaction was the 6 gram eraser launching a certain distance (in my case, 15 ft.).

This didn't work too well because I needed help with my lab to measure height, distance and weight so it was really a 2 person job. I decided that Kathryn and I will work together on our projects, one day doing hers and one day doing mine. So I briefly experimented with a double parachute dropping off the stairs. (We will decide how to alternate blogging: I think on days we do parachute, we will both blog about that and on days we do launching from the earth, we will both blog on that).

NEWTON'S INFOMERCIALS

REMOTE REPAIRS

Today I did a lab with Honore and Em where we conferenced over skype. We were supposed to tell each other how to put lego pieces together. Each of us had a finished piece and an unfinished piece. The goal was to describe the finished piece over skype to one person who had the parts to build it, and be described by another how to build the other one. That didn't work so well since the bags were messed up and no one had a finished piece. I had to cheat (Bert said I could!)and run over to get half my pieces from Honore. But overall, it was fun to talk over skype!

This doesn't exactly relate to Newton's 3rd law. But I can understand how good communication and description would be needed on a rocket mission, to be able to fix something yourself without getting any visual pictures about it, only hearing it.

LAUNCHING TO THE MOON

Yesterday, I did a lab with Taryn where we managed a 4.7 million dollar budget to a few objects up a 45 degree tilted upward string. First, we had a paper towel tube on the string and blew up a balloon. We taped the balloon with the hole facing backwards, let go of the hole, and as the air flew out, our tube went half way up the string. On our second attempt, we had the same set up-but this time we blew up the balloon more. For this, our tube went all the way to the top.

Next, since the first launch was completed, we attached the battery to the tube to add more weight. As we let go of the opening to the balloon, the tube went 3/4 of the way of the string. After that, we ran out of time.

TRIALS:

1st trial: fail (only went half way up w/o any extra weight attached) -20,000 (for wasted fuel)

2nd trial: success (all the way to the top w/o any extra weight attached.)

3rd trial: fail (3/4 of the way up w/ a battery attached) -20,000 (for wasted fuel)


NEWTON'S 3rd LAW:

This lab relates to Newton's 3rd law- for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction, because as the as the air was pushed out of the balloon, the opposite reaction would be for the balloon to move at the same force up the string as the air pushed out of it (which it did). The only thing (besides technical difficulties, i.e. tape not strong enough) that could go wrong with this lab is if the air coming out of the balloon was not fast enough with enough force to have the balloon move as fast as the air up the string, before it slides down.

PARACHUTES

Today my group and I did a lab that consisted of making a parachute, strong enough to hold up a "person" (binder clip & metal stick figure) when blown upwards by a hairdryer, but light enough to float down so our "person" wouldn't get hurt. Our first attempt was a piece of plastic bag about 0.5 meters by 0.5 meters. The ends were hole-punched with reinforcements and pieces of string in them that held our "person". We held the hairdryer right under the bag and turned it on to high. but the parachute floated all over and sank heavily to the ground.

In the second trial we cut a hole about the size of billiard ball in the middle of the plastic bag. We thought this would work better because then all the air from the hairdryer wouldn't be concentrated under the bag without an outlet for the extra. When we held the hairdryer under the bag, the whole parachute flew away and sank again. Then we used the same design but this time, we put the hair dryer under the "person" on the bottom of the parachute, instead of right under the bag. This worked well- we were able to hold the parachute up stable for about 20 seconds. I think the reasons why the hairdryer under the parachute works better is because:

1. You can't get the hairdryer exactly in the middle of right under the bag, so this tends to blow it all over (and since we had no extension cord for the hairdryer, it was hard to keep up).

2. Also, even on the lowest hairdryer setting, there is a lot of air blowing upward so it caused the bag to crumple a little.

3. Lastly, when the air was under the whole contraption, it forced our "person" as well as the parachute to be held up, not just the bag.

4. In real life, air pushing upwards will becoming from under the person, not just under the bag.

Relation to Newton's 3rd law:

Newton's 3rd law states that for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. This law plays a part in this experiment, because in the world with no other forces, except the ones in Newton's 3rd law, the parachute would float in the air because as the air pushes up on the bag, an equal force pushes down so it would stay in one place. The reason parachutes float down to earth is because even though the actions are the same, gravity is pulling down the parachute towards earth (at 9.8 m/s^2) and earth is the closest most massive object with a strong gravitational pull.

AFRICA

MOVING TO THE MOON

So today I am moving to the moon and going diving. And I have to figure out what the differences are between diving on the earth and diving on the moon (the earth as 9.8m/s^2 and the moon has 1.6m/s^2 of acceleration due to gravity). I think the obvious one would be that when I jumped off the diving board, I wouldn't be pulled down as quickly because there is less acceleration due to gravity. Also, I think there is less friction in the air on the moon so at the same time, I would be pulled down faster because there is less friction pushing back on me. Another way it would be different to dive on the moon is when I get into the water, I would come up out of the water faster and become more buoyant because there isn't as much gravity pushing me down. Also when I dive of the board I could jump higher in the air, and it would be slower to fall back sown so I would have a lot of time to o somersaults in the air.

LEGO ROBOT LINEAR COMMANDS

Today I did lab 2 with my partners and or goal was to command a lego robot car on RoboLab so it would travel on a certain path around the surface of Mars (a piece of red cardboard). This challenge was a lot of estimating because we had to know for how long the car should travel in one direction to a boulder (brown lego) and at what strength the motors should be running.

First I programmed motors A and B to run at 3 power for 10 seconds (which ended up going about .5 meters). Then I commanded Motor B only to go so he whole car would turn left (5 power for 2 seconds gave it a full circle). Then I continued with both motors and the car went up on the built ramp, dumbing he boulder (brown lego) off of it.

Relation to Newton's 3rd law:
I don't quite know how this can relate to Newton's 3rd law. The only way I can think of was as the car rolled two things happen. The ground pushed up just as hard on the car as he car pushed down on it so it caused some friction which made us change our commands to go for a little longer. Also as the car moved forward, and equal force of air pushed back on it so we had to set the motor at a somewhat higher gear and have the car travel a little farther than what it would if here was no friction.

THRUST STRUCTURES

Today I did a lab with my partners and we were working on thrust and seeing how launching a rocket compares to Newton's 3rd law. Our assignment was to build a structure out of craft sticks that was light enough to launch our "rocket" (a 1-liter soda bottle) a meter high, but strong enough to withstand the pressure of a 2 km bag of sand (from about 1 meter up) dropped on it and, to hold out for 3 tests. Our structure was basically a cube with only the edges made out of craft sticks and hot glue with extra sticks glued on top to hold the soda bottle.

How this relates to Newton's 3rd law:
Newton's 3rd law states that for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.
When the sandbag is dropped on one end of the "see-saw" the opposite reaction is force pushing off from the craft stick structure to launch the bottle over 1 meter high.

First test: The soda bottle launched off the meter stick
Second test: The soda bottle almost launched off the meter stick.
Third test: The soda bottle launched all the way off the meter stick (to about 1.3 meters)
Fourth test*: The soda bottle launched all the way off the meter stick


*we only tested a fourth time because the bottle never made it off the meter stick on the second one.