Rockets
by: Emma Norton & Cara Martin
Claim
In order to allow a rocket to stay in the air the longest it must included the following features: a nose cone, three triangular fins, and a parachute.
Reasoning
On the rocket it has a nose cone in order to keep the rocket from going sideways. The nose cone also kept the parachute from deploying to early by holding it in place until the rocket began to fall. It also included 3 fins to help the rocket have a straight flight and to keep the rocket from spining in the air. Finally it featured a parachute in order to make the rocket fall slower due to the resistance from the wind on the parachute as the bottle fell. This is an example of Newton's first law of motion (an object in motion will stay in motion unless acted upon by an unbalanced force) When the bottle began it fall the nose cone fell off allowing the parachute to deploy. As the parachute opens the wind pushing up past the rocket as it falls, pushes up on the parachute causing an unbalanced force that allowed the bottle to fall slower.The parachute proved to be very successful and did a very good job, the nose cone also did a good job of holding the parachute and allowing for a straighter flight. On the other hand the fins, though they kept the rocket from spinning out of control, they did not allow for a straight flight due to the fact that they weren't evenly spaced, because of this the rocket flew slightly sideways.Newton's 3rd law of motion states every action has an equal and opposite reaction, this proves to be true with this rocket as the pressure from the rocket pushes at the ground which results in opposite forces pushing back up at the rocket causing it to fly up and into the air until there is no longer a force pushing on the rocket, at this point the rocket began to fall. When the rocket hit the ground it had acquired a time of 6.97 seconds due to the successful features included on this rocket.
VIdeo's (first video Emma & Cara's rocket 6.97 seconds, Second video Laura and Kailey 3.0
http://youtu.be/W_P_1ouOgpw
http://youtu.be/4UOZBBOzxgY