About 3 weeks ago, we were sitting at our regular Saturday breakfast and Brandon mentioned that he was disappointed that he wasn't doing much cool hands-on stuff in is science class at school. I asked the kids if they would be interested in doing some fun science stuff at home and the response was overwhelmingly positive. So we are beginning a series of fun science activities at home.
10/21/2006
Each of the kids was given a raw egg and a $10 budget. The object is to drop the egg approximately 8-10 feet onto cement and have it not break.
On drop day, it was wet and a little icy, so my better judgment dictated that we would drop the eggs from a ladder instead of me climbing around on the roof. Here's the setup...
Each of the kids came up with their own design for the drop.
| Brandon's design was to place the egg in a plastic container with locking lid and lots of padding in the form of paper towels and toilet paper. He then attached a dozen helium balloons to the container to slow its descent. |
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| Brittany's design was to encase the egg in "wet foam" (the type used for flower arrangements) and use a large plastic shopping bag for a parachute. There was duct tape a plenty! |
| Breannon's design was to encase the egg in a small tin can with quilt batting and a plastic grocery bag for a parachute. |
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The eggs were dropped from the top of a ladder ... about the height of our basketball hoop. I lobbed them upwards, so actual descent was about 10 feet.
Drop #1:
Brandon's balloons worked extremely well and his container gently settled to the ground. Brittany's parachute also worked and her container landed with a light thud. Breannon's parachute did not open and her container landed hard, cracking her egg.
Drop #2:
One layer was removed from each of the two remaining containers. I tried to convince Brandon to shed the balloons, but he would have none of that. He duct taped his egg to the lid of his container, shedding the rest, but retaining the balloons. Once again, his container settled to the ground so gently that his bare egg did not crack (though on first toss it lofted into the neighbors yard due to the lack of ballast).
Brittany shed her parachute and her foam brick landed with a substantial thud. Her padding (due to both the foam and a great deal of duct tape) was sufficient to protect her egg.
Drop #2a:
While Brittany was peeling back the plethora of duct tape to check her egg, Brandon dropped his egg a third time (since he had more layer options). In this drop he shed the balloons and re-attached the base container to the lid. His egg survived this drop.
Drop #3:
Since the two remaining eggs had survived with minimal packaging, we decided to speed their descent by spiking them from the top of the ladder. Brandon's plastic container broke, leaving his egg sliding down the driveway. Brittany's well-padded foam brick bounced end over end and her egg survived. Winner!
All Eggs Must Die!
Not wanting to let any of these eggs get the best of me, I took extreme measures to finish off Brittany's stubborn egg. Egg vs. Jeep ... Jeep wins!
10/28/2006
Our original expectation:
We will be adding Mentos mints to a 2-liter bottle of Diet Coke to observe the results. We are expecting a significant eruption, as we have seen posted by others on the Internet.
The results:
There is going to be a sticky mess today!!!
Getting an entire package of Mentos into the 2-liter bottle of soda before the eruption ejected them proved to be challenging. We watched an episode of Mythbusters where they used a piece of PVC pipe. That worked quite well for them. We used rolled up copy paper, which was not as good, but got us reasonably close.
Brittany went first and scored a good eruption, but I didn't catch it on camera.
Breannon went next and had an excellent eruption.
Brandon went third and had a tube clog, so his eruption was limited ... but Brittany had fun trying to catch the flying Mentos in the soda stream.
Rob went last and was still trying to stuff Mentos into the bottle when the eruption occurred. The result was a very sticky Rob!
Want to see more Mentos & diet cola fun? Check here.
Oh, and a quick look at the Mentos website reveals that they have embraced the phenomenon, even sponsoring a geyser contest! I suspect they've sold more Mentos for geysers than consumption.
Planned for 11/11/2006
We will be building small vehicles that will use internally stored energy (any except chemical batteries or fuel cells) to propel themselves. The vehicle that goes the furthest on its own power only wins. Budget limit is $10 per vehicle.
