Newton's 2nd Law of Motion

Newton's second law states that the acceleration of an object equals the net force on the object divided by the object's mass (acceleration = force/mass). For example, if you have a bouncy ball and a bowling ball and you throw them with the same amount of force, the bouncy ball with go further because it has less mass than the bowling ball. This is why we wanted to make our rocket with the least amount of mass as possible. We tried not to add too much tape to the bottle because even tape can slightly change the mass of the rocket. We also used a small bottle. We added only a small amount of clay into the nose cone but enough to help our rocket.

Rocket Launch Data

When we launched our rocket it was in the air for 5.00 seconds and it traveled 101.681 meters. (333.6 feet)
We calculated that the average speed of our rocket was 20.3362 m/s. We also observed that our rocket had a great amount of spin.

First Rockets in Space

In 1942, Germany launched the first rocket into space. This was around the time of the Cold War. Because the United States was also trying to improve space technology, this caused tension. Although at the time because they beat us into space we thought they were better, this really helped the US in the long run. This motivated us to also launch our own rockets into space and further improve our space technology before any other country. Not too long after, on July 20, 1969 the United States accomplished a huge achievement by becoming the first country to step on the moon. To this day, our country is one of the countries with the most knowledge of space and the best space technology. If Germany hadn't beat us to the launching of the first rocket into space, it wouldn't have pushed us to be where we are today.

Newton's 3rd Law of Motion

Newton's 3rd law states that every force has an equal and opposite reaction force. An example is pushing off the ground when on a skateboard. As you push back, you and the skateboard move forward. Our rocket is also a great example of this law. The pressure in the rocket causes the water to push out the bottom of the rocket. The water pushing out the bottom causes the rocket to fly.

Finished Rocket

This is our rocket with the nose cone and fins on it. We cut off the top of another 20oz Smart Water bottle and also cut off the mouth piece of the bottle. We then placed clay in it so that it was 20g lighter then our rocket. Next we taped the nose cone to the top of the rocket. This is what the rocket look like when it was completed.

This is a picture of our fins when they are glued together. We glued the non-colored cardboard sides together so they would stick together better. We also folded down the edges so that we could stick the fins on the rocket.

Construcing Fins

These are our fins that we cut out of cereal box before we glued them together for a more sturdy and thicker fin. Each fin is 4cm by 4cm.

Starting Our Rocket

We used a 20oz Smart Water bottle for our rocket. To place our four fins an equal distance around the bottle we took a string and wrapped it around the bottle then measured it. We found the circumference to be 21cm. Next we divided the 21cm by 4 to find the distance between each fin. Our fins were positioned 5.25cm apart. By placing the blue tape 5.25cm apart, we made sure that the fins would be an equal distance apart. It is extremely important for fins to have equal distances between each other in order for the rocket to have good rotation. The tape also provided an area to glue the fins on because gluing directly on the bottle would weaken the air chamber and cause the rocket to explode.