Marble Roller Coaster Lab - Loudoun County Public Schools



Marble Roller Coaster Lab (Styrofoam)

Roller Coaster Name:

Your Name:

Team members:

Purpose: Your goal is to design and build the wildest roller coaster ride that will deliver a marble safely to the end. You must at least demonstrate three successful consecutive runs.

Criteria: Your roller coaster should have at least

• 2 hills, 2 turns and 1 vertical loop (extra credit for extra loops, hills or turns)

Materials:

• 6 ft x 2 length of insulation tubing (Home Depot item # OEP11838, 1-1/8” x 3/8” OR OES7838, 7/8” x 3/8”. Available in the plumbing aisle)

• scissors

• tooth picks

• glue & tape

• support material like wood sticks or paper cups

• standard size poster board

• marble

• stop watch & ruler (supplied)

Procedure: You and your team will design your roller coaster and must submit your design first for approval before starting your construction. The poster board will serve as a base and the foam tubing will serve as the track. These can be cut to fit your design. Your coaster needs to be designed and constructed with the criteria mentioned above. You will need to make Potential energy and Kinetic energy estimates. For this you need to measure the height of the roller coaster from where the marble starts to the base where the marble ends its trip. You also need to estimate the velocity of the marble as it rolls off at the end. The entire group must make the demonstration in front of the class and also speak on their project for 5 minutes. You will talk about the history and physics of roller coasters, and your team’s experience in building it. Your roller coaster must have a theme and the class will vote for the most decorated roller coaster, which will get a bonus of 5 points.

Rubric: No loop, No Hill, No turn: No grade

2 Hills 2 Turns 1 loop - 45 pts

2 Hills 1 Turn 1 loop - 40 pts

1 Hill 2 turns 1 loop - 35 pts

1 hill 1 turn 1 loop - 30 pts

0 hill 1 turn 1 loop - 25 pts

1 hill 0 turn 1 loop - 20 pts

--- --- 0 loop No points

Workmanship 10 pts

Presentation 10 pts

Calculations 20 pts

Conclusions 10 pts

Theme & Decoration 5 pts

Calculations:

Mass of marble (kg) = m =

Track Height (m) = h =

Horizontal Distance traveled (m) = dx

Height of the table (m) = dy

Time t (sec) = [pic]

Velocity (m/sec) v = dx / t =

Potential Energy (Joule) = m.g.h =

Kinetic Energy (Joule) = ½ m.v2 =

Energy Lost (P.E–K.E) =

%Efficiency = (K.E/P.E) x 100

Conclusion:

1. When was the first roller coaster made?

2. Which is the world’s highest coaster?

3. What do you think happened to the energy lost during the coaster ride

4. Identify all the forces acting on a passenger while going through a loop.

5. What scientific laws & facts are being demonstrated during the marble ride?

|Roller Coaster Project Rubric |

|Looking For… |Way! |Part Way |No Way |Scoring |

| | | | |Formal presentation |

| | | | |Confident & Coherent |

| | | | |/3 |

|Roller Coaster |Has all the appropriate number|Missing some of the |Missing a loop. Trials |Features |

| |of hills, loops and/or turns. |requisite features. 2 |not successful most of | |

| |3 successful trials in a row |successful trials in a row |the time | |

| | | | |/40 |

|Workmanship & Theme |Neat finish, painted and well |Splinters, lacking paint or |No theme, Structure |Workmanship |

| |decorated. Has a well defined |finish, wobbly. Theme is not|unstable |/10 |

| |theme. |apparent or silly or | |Theme |

| | |unappealing | |/5 |

|Calculations |All parameters noted |Some calculations done |Parameters not noted |Calculations |

| |accurately. Calculations done |wrong. |correctly. Large errors|/20 |

| |correctly. | |in calculations | |

|Conclusions |All questions answered fully |Some questions answered |Answers wrong or show |Conclusions |

| |and correctly |correctly or partial answers|lack of understanding |/10 |

|Teamwork |Team has worked well together |Some team members worked |Most on the work has |Effective Teamwork Documented |

| |to produce an effective and |harder than others in |been done by one person| |

| |strong product, with equal |completing the project | | |

| |distribution of tasks | | | |

| | | | | |

| | | | |/5 |

................
................

In order to avoid copyright disputes, this page is only a partial summary.

Google Online Preview   Download