Post Rocket Launching Lab (Jasmine and Kelly)

For our rocket, we used a variety of supplies to create a successful launch.  These materials included the top half of a bottle (used for the nose), the body of another bottle (used for the portion that held the parachute), and one full bottle (used as the portion of the rocket where the water was contained).  For the fins we used manilla folder paper. For our parachute we used a plastic garbage bag (36.5  inches in diameter) along with 12 38-inch pieces of string to connect it to our rocket.  Today we wanted to experiment with different ways to improve our rocket time.  Instead of using the top half of the bottle as our cone like we did yesterday, we decided to use a small athletic cone.  We decided to use a cone because it was what our previous plan was. However, after the launch we realized that it wasn't as successful as our launch with the bottle top.  The cone was too loose on the ground and was not coming off in the air... causing the parachute to not deploy.  

Regarding the fins, instead of just using paper we decided to put cardboard into the each fin to make it heavier and not as flimsy... increasing the stability.  After multiple launches we decided that using the cardboard in the wings was very successful.  The way we folded the parachute also made a huge difference on our launch results.  Strangely, when we didn't fold the parachute neatly it deployed at the right time and went exactly how we planned. 

For our highest launch, the psi had to be way higher than what we had it at. Instead of a psi of 20, we learned that a higher psi would get our rocket to soar for at least 10 seconds. Our final psi was 68.  The amount of water that we used was also very important. Yesterday, we were estimating the amount of water that we should put into our rocket. This morning, we started with a little over half of the bottle. However, it was unsuccessful leading us to realize that the lower the amount of water, the better. We decided to go with a third of the bottle filled with water. When we did this, we could pump more air into the water, increasing the water pressure. This was one of the most important factors in how high up our rocket flew.

We learned that in order to have a successful rocket you need to  have balanced masses on the top and on the bottom.  Not too much mass but not too little.  Air resistance played a huge role in our rocket launching  so in order to reduce air resistance we used the top half of a bottle as a stable nose cone.  Other things that we learned included working together and following directions! Working together was vital to our successful rocket. If we had not worked together, there would’ve been too many ideas being thrown around and we wouldn’t have been able to build a successful rocket. Along those lines, if we had not followed directions, building this rocket would’ve been chaotic because we’d be trying to figure out the best approach to things. 

This project was super fun and cool.  Kelly and I were stoking and were determined to get the longest rocket in the air but we didn't and that's cool too.  We tried our best and had a lot of fun launching and watching everyone's rocket.  I had so much fun and am really happy the way our individual group results turned out and also our classes.  YAY!