Rocket Reflection

by
Nutchanon Charnwutiwong
Suparuek Saetoen
Natanicha Sangprakai
Pannacha Lertlarpnont
Thanawin Ungkananuchat
1. Analysis
When it launched, our rocket
went straight to the air because of the
water that we added in the bottle and
the pressure that we pumped in. But
after the water in the bottle is
decreased, the rocket tends to turn
around like a roller coaster. When to
water is empty, the rocket fell down to
the ground quickly.
1.1 How long is our rocket?
Approximately 2.5 second
1.2 Maximun height and calculation

At the maximum height, where the rocket

stop going up and before returning to the
ground, the velocity of the rocket is zero.
The acceleration of the gravitation from
the Earth is 9.8 m/s and it is negative
value because it is acting in the opposite
direction of the rocket. For the initial
velocity, it is substituted with the value
calculated from the question number 3
below.
 1.3 Maximum velocity and calculation

The displacement from the rocket’s

launching point to the point where it return
to the ground is about 0 (assuming the
height of the stand of the launcher is
negligible). The acceleration of the
gravitation from the Earth is 9.8 m/s2 and
it is negative value because it is acting in
the opposite direction of the rocket. For
time, 2.5 seconds, is a round up value
according to our experiment.
 2. Role of friction play in rocket's
performance

The friction did play role in the

performance of our rocket. Our rocket
head is not as sharp as it could be so it
might create more friction from air
resistance. Our rocket also short,
which means that when it fall, it creates
less friction and make it fall faster than
the long one. So, friction did hinder our
rocket because it decreased our
rocket’s acceleration.
 3. Transformation of the energy in the
rocket
When we add pressure into the bottle, the
acceleration due to pressure acting against
the launch tube. So, the rocket stay at the
launcher because we had the lock
mechanism locking the rocket in place. After
we released the rocket, the acceleration due
to the reaction force of the water being
ejected made the rocket fly into the air.
There is also a reaction force from the air
being ejected from the rocket. When there is
nothing to be ejected from the bottle, the
rocket will be in a coast phase which it will go
until there is no more power to fight against
the gravity. When the rocket reaches it
maximum height, it will fall down to earth due
to the gravitational force from the Earth.
 When we add the air pressure, the
potential energy that stored in the bottle
is increased. Then, we launch the
rocket which transform the potential
energy in the bottle to become kinetic
energy. This kinetic energy is the
energy that launched the rocket to the
air.
4. How this project our understanding
of work and energy?
We have a chance to apply the topic that
we studied, which is work and energy, to
calculated in the real activity. The stored
energy when we add the pressure to the
bottle is potential energy. Then, when we
launch the rocket, the potential energy
changed to kinetic energy that make the
rocket fly to the air.
 However, the energy did not increased
or decreased because of the law of
conservation of energy that the potential
energy just changed into kinetic energy.

5. How did you feel about this project

when it was first assigned?

We thought that it was very hard

because it was a new thing that we
never did before. We also thought that
it would not be fun and a waste of time
to do it because we did not think that it
could be calculated in many parts that
related to physics. Moreover, we are
not sure that our rocket is going to
work well or not if we made one.
 6. How do you feel about this project
now that it has concluded?

It was very fun and enjoyable when we

launched the rocket into the air. We can
see the motion of the rocket which
leads to the analysis of the rocket. We
can see the problem that happened to
our rocket in the first launch, so we can
modify it and launch it again to have the
best record. We compared our rocket to
the group that gets the highest height
and finds out our rocket’s mistake. And
we are quite satisfy with our result
because we did not even think that the
rocket is going to work.
7. What would you have done differently
as you and your team worked through
this project?

We do not have any member in our

group that have done this before, so we
have to do some research from the
internet about this rocket competition.
We find the information about the type of
rocket and wings that will lead to the
highest height. Furthermore, we find the
rocket that won the first place in the
competition to be the model and adapt to
our rocket. We find the amount of water
that we should add before we launch.
And if we can do it differently, we will
make our rocket stay in the air longer by
changing the model of the rocket.
The fins of our rocket was against the
wind so we need to check it first that it
is in the right rotation.