Rocket Project
Rocket Reflection
I walked onto the soccer field worrying about Defying Gravitiy's parachute deploying. This is because for the last two weeks that's what we had been working on. It wasn't deploying because it's nose cone was too big, but we still tried to use it becasue it made the rocket go very high. So at exhibition we added a smaller paper to the nose cone to see if it would help. When it was our turn we put our rocket on the launch pad. We turned the pressure to eighty P.S.I. and let it fly. It went very high then swerved to the left and nearly hit a kid. When we got it we took the paper part of the nose come off of the rocket. Our group was happy that it went so high and counted it successful.
The nose cone was a old small soccer ball so the physics of how much surface area kept constant pressure on the rocket. This problem stopped the parachute from deploying. Our rocket was launched a second time but it still didn't deploy. Now if I did it again I would change the nose cone to something smaller. I would tell next years classes to use light, but strong materials and that the parachute deploying is extremely important. This project was so fun and a great learning experience on how to refine and use what materials you have available.
Rocket Log
Day 6; Entry 1
Goal for the Day: Finish the nose cone
Completed: Finished the nose cone using a cut water bottle shaped into a cone with duct tape and calk glue.
Day 7; Entry 2
Goal for the Day: Have a successful test launch and see what needs to be perfected
Completed: Part success in launching rocket. There was a snag on the parachute because of a paperclip so it did not deploy, and when it came down, an extension came off the rocket.
Day 8; Entry 3
Goal for the Day: Re-glue extension and solve parachute mishap
Completed: Re-glued extension, removed paperclip so that the parachute won't snag, and we have decided to replace the nose cone because it does not work very well.
Day 9; Entry 4
Goal for the Day: Replace nose cone and attach parachute to new nose cone
Completed: Replaced the nose cone with half a miniature soccer ball. During test launches, the nose cone worked better in some aspects more than others. The nose cone causes the rocket to veer off to the right, but the height and length was improved. The problem was the surface area of the ball was too big, so our theory is that if we make the surface area smaller, it will help it fly straighter.
Day 10; Entry 5
Goal for the Day: Fix the nose cone
Completed: Used an e-xacto knife to make the surface area smaller, and tried to test it by dropping the rocket off of high levels around the building.
Day 11; Entry 6
Goal for the Day: Beautify the rocket
Completed: Decorated the rocket with glitter glue-completed the skull, stars, and the teams' initials on the top of the rocket.
Day 12; Entry 7
Goal for the Day: Beautify the Rocket and trying new extensions!
Completed: The girls in the group glittered the rocket by writing "Defying Gravity" on the side of the rocket opposite of the skull and stars. We then tried to caulk glue plywood to the top of the soccer ball, hoping that it will help catch air. We will see if it stuck tomorrow, because we were having troubles applying it.
Day 13, Entry 8
Goal for the Day: Fix nose cone because it veers off to the side
Completed: We used card paper to make a small cone to go on top of the soccer ball, because the plywood did not work, it popped off first thing in class. Hopefully this will hopefully make the rocket fly straighter, so that when it comes back down it will catch more air and the parachute will deploy. Unfortunately, we don't have a test launch before the exhibition, so, fingers crossed! Exhibition time!
Data Table
Rocket Conclusion
The rocket Defying Gravity had an angle of 57 degrees when it flew at the exhibition, the observation table was 174 feet away from the launch pad, and the recorded hang time of the rocket was 6.42 seconds. This calculation was made when the team took the tangent of 57 degrees (1.53), multiplied by the distance of the observation table. To find the velocity average, the team took the square root of Max HT divided by one half. This final calculation was 27.41 m/s. From there we got our theoretical flight time by dividing the maximum height by Earth's,acceleration (9.8 m/s) by 0.5. To find the percent error, the actual flight time was subtracted from the theoretical flight time, divided by theoretical flight time, then multiplied by one-hundred. (-93.58%) The actual flight time and theoretical flight had a major difference for Defying Gravity because our rocket flew upward and sideways. The parachute also didn't deploy, making our free fall faster.