Excellent project spent 15 dollars and 2 hours putting together building rockets.... Son did 95 % himself and entertained family and friends for hours when project was done :)
Perfect. I am looking for a simple ballistic project for Upward Bound this summer. This is it. Cheap, show students the video and let them build it. We will measure the distance as a function of the angle. We can record who launched it to help keep the force similar for each launch. I think we may put vanes on the fins to (perhaps) spin stabilize the rocket. (Upward Bound is part of the TRIO program in US Dept of Educ. Celebrated 50 years in 2015. Check it out. I am sort of retired and have been doing Upward Bound for 8 years. Plus tutoring for a community college. Both keep the neurons firing. )
This is great! I needed a Science Experiment for my students at our science fair at end of April! I will use this over another one I found. I am going to compare different bottle sizes to see which has the greater thrust give the same amount of pressure on the bottle. what do you think? thanks again1
+Roy Trost-Rekich The only trouble would be controlling how quickly the pressure is applied if someone steps on the bottle. Using a falling object would be the most consistent that I can think of off hand. In the classroom we use a pressurised PVC pipe with an electric sprinkler valve to launch rockets and it works great. Pressurize to 30PSI and then open the valve with three 9v batteries and the rockets fly impressively far. It's also very consistent.
You can use 2 bottles connected with 2 90 degree elbows and a "T" fitting between them then out to the 2 threaded elbows launch tube for more "thrust"! That way, you and a friend can jump on them together and have it fly even further. Then you can get 2 "chubby" friends to jump on the bottles and then it'll fly REAAAALLLLLLLLY far...........I think that's how Iran launched their scud missile's.
Regular paper would probably be better as I think it may hold more pressure. If you don't have any other paper construction paper would work just won't hold quite the same pressure witch won't likley matter unless you use an air compressor to launch it much further.
I wanted a video shot where the rocket landed in front of the camera looking back at me and if you stomp hard enough to get 300 feet the rocket is not accurate enough to land in front of the camera.
You can totally reuse the bottle but the 100th rocket won't likley go quite as far as the first one. If you are doing a lot I would also have 1or 2 back-up bottles incase it breaks when stomping on it really hard.
Hello I know it's been a while since you uploaded the video but I have a question? How far does the rocket go I really want something to impress my friends with.
Stomping on a 2-liter bottle it will go about 20 meters give or take. Using an air compressor at 80 psi and an electronic sprinkler valve, a good design will go closer to 100 meters.
Yes, you will need salt. You can salt out the water and get above 90% isopropyl but with salt dissolved. Then if you need to remove the salt you can use distillation to get relatively pure isopropyl mixed with very small amounts of water.
To work well the tube needs to fit tightly around the pvc pipe and cardboard might be too loose but experiment with cardboard and paper and see what you find out.
