My Soaring Straws Lab
In class we recently did a lab, with toilet paper rockets. We pulled back the straw on the rubber band to get the elastic potential energy. I found out that the more Elastic Potential Energy (EPE) there is, the more Gravitational Potential Energy (GPE) there is. The EPE which was the amount of stretch in our experiment was the manipulated variable. It is the manipulated variable because we changed how many centimeters we pulled the straw back. The responding variable was the height, because depending on how far back we stretched the straw, the height changed. When I stretched the straw back 1cm, my average height was 2.09m, which is different from when I stretched the straw back 5cm, the average height was 6.28m which is higher. So, when I had more EPE for my 5cm trial, my GPE was 115.23mj, but when I stretched it back 1 cm, my GPE was only 34.85mj.
Some errors in my lab were that we did this over a period of days, and all the different classes used the same rockets, so I don't know if the rubber band on the rocket broke in other classes or not, but in my class it did. Also, the toilet paper tube bent down more on the sides, so the results might not be that accurate. I also had a hard time seeing exactly how far the straw went up because sometimes the straw went to the left or right. We could make this lab better by getting stronger materials, because then we wouldn't spend so much time trying to rebuild our rocket, and our data would be more accurate. I also think we should build our own individual rockets, because then our own data would be more accurate.
In class we recently did a lab, with toilet paper rockets. We pulled back the straw on the rubber band to get the elastic potential energy. I found out that the more Elastic Potential Energy (EPE) there is, the more Gravitational Potential Energy (GPE) there is. The EPE which was the amount of stretch in our experiment was the manipulated variable. It is the manipulated variable because we changed how many centimeters we pulled the straw back. The responding variable was the height, because depending on how far back we stretched the straw, the height changed. When I stretched the straw back 1cm, my average height was 2.09m, which is different from when I stretched the straw back 5cm, the average height was 6.28m which is higher. So, when I had more EPE for my 5cm trial, my GPE was 115.23mj, but when I stretched it back 1 cm, my GPE was only 34.85mj.
Some errors in my lab were that we did this over a period of days, and all the different classes used the same rockets, so I don't know if the rubber band on the rocket broke in other classes or not, but in my class it did. Also, the toilet paper tube bent down more on the sides, so the results might not be that accurate. I also had a hard time seeing exactly how far the straw went up because sometimes the straw went to the left or right. We could make this lab better by getting stronger materials, because then we wouldn't spend so much time trying to rebuild our rocket, and our data would be more accurate. I also think we should build our own individual rockets, because then our own data would be more accurate. 
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