The Rolling Thunder ProjectThe Rolling Thunder Project
The objective of this project is to teach students basic
concepts regarding energy (kinetic and potential), acceleration, velocity,
friction and vectors. The project will require instruction on some basic
principles of physics. In addition it will teach them how to perform a
scientific experiment and how to measure and record the resultant data.
For
the experiment students will be broken up into teams of two (2). Each team will
be given the materials needed to build an adjustable ramp that is 18 inches
long. The students will have access to a measuring device and a computer. The
students will supply one Hot Wheels® car of their choosing. The object of the
project is to determine how far the car will roll out after reaching the bottom
of the ramp. All cars will start with their rear end at the farthest point back
on the ramp, and the roll out will be measured from the bottom of the ramp to
the back end of the car. The students will gather data about the ramp triangle
and the roll out distances for various chosen ramp angles and a series of trial
runs. A minimum of five (5) trial runs and a minimum for five (5) ramp angles
will be required. The students will record their data in a computer spreadsheet
of their design, and will analyze this data using formulas that they will write
for the spread sheet.
A competition will be held on the final day of the project. The instructor will name a specific roll out distance and each team will have one try, using the calculations from there spread sheet, to reach the given distance. The team that comes closest to the distance will receive an award. This competition can be altered to more than one distance trial and the team with the lowest average is determined to be the winner
This version of the mousetrap cars project was created by
