Rocket Day

 

A hands-on activity where students prepared and launched a pressurizes plastic soda bottle and measured the maximum altitude. There was also a demonstration of actual model rockets being launched in the afternoon.


During the morning, each team split into 

  • Launch Command (1 student from each team), 

    • These students were the ones who authorized the order of launch for each rocket that was brought out to the pad, each of the five and Mr. Jeff Hopkins measured the time of flight of each rocket using stopwatches - tossing out the lowest and highest times and averaging the other three recordings for the final time of flight.

  • Launch Control (2 students for each team), 

    • Each team had its own launch control group of two students who would attach the rocket to the launch tube, sound the "all clear", wait for the Launch Command to give the "thumbs up" and then start the air compressor that would build up the pressure in about 30 seconds to 40 psi and "swoosh!" off it goes. 

    • The launcher was built by Alan Grier, Engineering Professor at MTC - GearUp Curriculum Coordinator.

  • Rocket Control (remaining team members)

    • the remaining team members would spend the first hour designing nose cones and tail fins or wings plus any other designs on the 2-liter bottles. Each team attempted to construct three rockets of different designs within the allotted time, though some teams managed to build more than three. They then filled the bottles about 1/4 to 1/3 of water and brought them out to Command  Control to have their rocket registered and wait for permission to launch.

Images 1-4 are of some of the GearUp students preparing to launch their 2-liter bottle rockets using water and compressed air.
Click on the images below to see larger versions


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Here's some of the GearUp rockets and their flight times.
(the Gold Team and Silver Team joined together to make up for absent members)

Team Rocket Flight-time
(in seconds)
Gold/Silver J-5 1.5
Gold/Silver J-5 Extreme 2.5
Gold/Silver Lucky 3.5
Red Red Hurricane 3.2
Red The Unknown 2.4
Red BlastOff 3.2
Red Chadd's Red Team 2.7
Blue Blue Voyager 2.5
Blue Sputnik 2 0.9
Blue Blue Cruiser 2.8
Blue Blue Cruiser 2 4.7
Green Purple Dragon 1.5
Green Green Machine 1.9
Green Crusade 2000 2.7
Green Speeding Bullet 3.3
Green Apollo 2000 2.0

The Blue Team's Blue Cruiser 2 was a last minute adaptation of the Blue Cruiser. All other rockets including the Blue Cruiser had been constructed with cardboard nose cones and fins (wings). The Blue Cruiser 2 had its fins removed with only the nose cone remaining - obvious success contributed to the last minute design changes by David Dubose.

After lunch, Joe Rodgers, the husband of Cindy Rogers, Gear Up's  Parent/Guardian Association Facilitator, launched several solid fuel rockets . 

Images 5-8 are of the Rodgers' explaining the demonstration they are about 
to give to the GearUp students on the launching of model rockets.
Click on the images below to see larger versions


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The conclusion of Rocket Day marked the last Saturday Academy for this term and the awards ceremony followed immediately afterwards.

 

© 2000 Jeffrey Lynn Hopkins & MTC Last edited Monday, May 29, 2000 01:05:48 PM