Science: Speed
In science this year our focus will be physics. To start off the year we looked at Newton’s laws of physics. We went over each of the terms, put them in layman perspective, and put our knowledge into action. We were given hot wheels, marbles, tracks, and a few other supplies and told to start experimenting. At first we were able to do whatever we wanted as long as it represented at least one of Newton’s laws. However, all of my groups experiments were a bust. At first we created downward facing tubes, which were used to be a sort of upside down track to test speed vs. mass with marbles (Newton’s second law). Unfortunately the tube/track was unstable and eventually caved in. Then we tried making rubber band launchers to try and launch multiple marbles at a time and see the reaction between the bounce against the wall (Newton’s third law), but were unable to do anything more then launch rubber bands onto our fingers.
After two days of failed experiments we were then asked to find a way to measure speed with our hot wheels. With a track that was 3.7 yds long, a launcher, a hot wheel, and a stopwatch I started experimenting. I kept record of 7 of the times and averaged it out to 110.4829213 inches per second. With a lot of help from Carwai (honestly I can’t recall how the final number came to be) we were able to figure out an average of 6.19 mi/hr. The interesting thing too was that my car, 40.1 grams, could have around the same speed as one 6 or 7 grams lighter, weight didn’t seem to play to much of a role.
Although we all came up with final conclusions on our speed, there was not only a lot of time and effort put into the experiment, but it had a lot of human error mixed in with it. We all did use the same method to calculate our times, but there were the minor differences that made the seemingly similar experiments unique to one and other. Your experiment was altered by the condition of your car (some brand new, while others had their battle scars), length of track, temperature and air density, controlling of the stopwatch, launchers reliability, and more. Even the amount of people in the room at that time and the positions they were in could determine if your car would stay consistent, or jump off of the railing. As Carwai pointed out though, there isn’t much we can really do about it, but we can still get a basic idea and a better understanding of the concepts that we’re learning. As for future experiments, I’m hoping to go further into the laws and get a very clear understanding. I want to be able to create experiments with not only the more basic ideas of physics, but also the more subtle experiments that you wouldn’t even realize could relate to physics, if that makes sense.
