ACADEMY FOR MATH, ENGINEERING, AND SCIENCE

Rocket Lab Report

Michael Cheung B3 2/1/2014 Mr. Hendricks

Abstract
The purpose of the lab to see if what the students at the Academy of Math, Engineering, and Science Honors Physics class learned during their first semester could be applied to the real world. This was done by using varies model rockets and having them predict and then calculate the heights of those rockets. The students were given multiple mini-labs to test what they had learned. The first of these mini-labs had to do with impulse and had them find the engine type, the second had them learn drag force by using a free-body diagram, and the third had them learn numerical iterations. When the lab was finished and the calculated heights were compared to the predicted, none of the data matched and most were significantly off. An example of this would be the red/silver rocket where the predicted was about 63 meters with the calculated being around 480 meters.

Introduction
This lab was done to test how equations learned in the Physics Honors class can be applied to the real world by using model rockets with varies engines and weights. The Lab was made into multiple mini-labs done over the course of two weeks. For this lab the following terms and definitions must be known. Kinematics is the study of motion. Dynamics is the study of forces acting on an object and how it affects its motion. Impulse is the amount of force that is exerted over a period of time or Force multiplied by Time. Momentum is the mass of an object multiplied by the velocity of the object. Drag Force is the amount of air resistance an object face as it travels and is affected by its shape and size. Drag Coefficient is a constant that can be found when the drag force and the velocity is known and varies for different objects. This will be constant for the shape and amount of surface area that is exposed once calculated for that object.

The impulse momentum one of the equations that is used which is Impulse = P and is derived on a page later in this report. There are multiple types of model rocket engines with different letters and numbers. The letter on each rocket tells you its impulse where A is 2.5, B is 5, C is 10, by knowing this one can easily find the impulse of an engine by multiplying 1.25 by 2 to the power of a number corresponding with that number where A is 1, B is 2 and C is 3 and so on. The first number that is next to the letter is the average force that the rocket exerts during its burn time so a C6 has an impulse of 10 and an average force of 6, where a B6 has an impulse of 5 and an average force of 6. The number that is hyphened apart from the letter and first number is the parachute delay that is used to deploy the parachute after the rocket is launched for recovery. Numerical iteration play a huge part in finding the predicted as there is no one easy equation that can be used and must be separated out into smaller multiple equations. Numerical iterations is the process of using multiple little equations in a sequence to solve for an answer that would be impossible or too complex to solve without splitting it up.

Engine Thrust Analysis

To get data to find the impulse of the rocket a cart was taken and a box was bolted on to it to contain the engine. A digital force gauge was attached to a track that the cart fitted and measured the force in Newton. When the cart pushed against the force gauge it gave a negative number, if it was pulled it gave a positive value. The digital force gauge was attached to CBL on a calculator to collect data and the program EasyData was used. During the setup, the force from gauge was zeroed in the program to make sure the data from the push cart pushing against it and not the force of the cart lightly hitting the sensor. A trigger was set up as well so that the calculator will start saving the data collected when the engine is lit and starts pushing

against the sensor. The trigger was set so that it would start saving data when the force decreased over -1N. The program was also setup to save the about 10% of the data before the cart started to push against the sensor to get a more accurate picture the forces that the sensor encountered. The program collected data every .02 sec and collected data until it reached 3.6 sec but the data that is needed to find the impulse is within the first 1.3 seconds. The data was then used to find the average force the engine pushed with by finding the area under the curve using both right-endpoint and left-endpoint formulas. The data points used to find the area under the curves are listed below in the table excluding 0, 0.1, and 0.2 sec as they were not data points that mattered as the data that mattered because they are in the positive value meaning the sensor at those times were collecting a pulling force which is not what is needed. The left-endpoint under the curve had an average force of 4.005 N while the right-endpoint had an average force of 4.107 N the values are changed to a positive value as they are just scalars at this point. By taking the average of the two it becomes 4.076 N as an average because leftendpoint measures the lower average and the right-endpoint measures the higher average. This data suggest that the rocket engine in the box is a B4 engine as an A engine has an impulse of 2.5 while a B has an impulse of 5 and the impulse of this engine is closer to 5 then 2.5. The 4 after the B is because it had an average of 4 N per sec.

Force of Rocket (N)

2 0 -2 -4 -6 -8 -10 -12
1

2 0 -2 -4 -6 -8 -10 -12
2

1 2

Actual Graph of Data collected Graph of Selected Data

0 0.16 0.32 0.48 0.64 0.8 0.96 1.12 1.28 1.44 1.6 1.76 1.92 2.08 2.24 2.4 2.56 2.72 2.88 3.04 3.2 3.36 3.52

Rocket Force (N)

0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.9 1 1.1 1.2 1.3

Time in Sec Force in N 0 .05 .1 .07 .2 .15 .3 -.4 .4 -5.02 .5 -10.14 .6 -5.24 .7 -3.82 .8 -3.55 .9 -3.95 1.0 -3.94 1.1 -3.99 1.2 -1.42 1.3 .02

Drag Force
The purpose of this lab is to find the drag force coefficient of a rocket. The drag force coefficient can be used to get an approximation of how high a rocket may go if it is launched. To find out the drag coefficient of a rocket, it is best to put the rocket that is to be launched in to a wind tunnel, however for this lab a similar rocket that is slightly smaller is put into the wind tunnel. The setup for this is to have the rocket dangling from the top of the tunnel while having a protractor on the string centered so that the string is at the 90 mark on the protractor while having the rocket as leveled as possible and not tipping forward or backward too much.

After setting up the rocket in the wind tunnel, the wind tunnel should be turned on with a set wind velocity. As the wind tunnel is turned on, the wind should be pushing against the rocket as the wind is being sucked into the wind tunnel from a fan in the back. The force of the wind will make the rocket form an angle with the 90 and should be recorded. The weight of the rocket should be measured in kilograms. The equation to find the Drag Coefficient is Kd = Fdrag / V2 where Kd is the Drag coefficient V being velocity and Fdrag being drag force. This equation works because Fdrag V2 and to make it an equation a constant must be added to the V2. Kd is the constant added so the equation Fdrag = Kd * V2. Fdrag is found by using tan mg = Fdrag3.

Deriving of the equation is done on a reference page.

The for this equation is the angled measured during the wind tunnel m, being the mass of the rocket measured in Kg, and g is gravity being 9.81. The measure for the rocket that was used was at 27 2 as the angle was recorded by sight. The rocket also wavered a bit while it was being pushed by the wind however; because of the honeycomb design of the wind tunnel where the wind comes in the turbulence is reduced from what it could have been. The velocity of wind in the wind tunnel was recorded to be 15 meters/sec and the mass of the rocket was measured to be 61 grams or 0.061 Kg. When put into the equation tan mg = Fdrag, Fdrag was found to be 0.3045 and is then used to find Kd by using the equation Fdrag/V2. Kd is found to be 0.0013537 however, because of significant figures it becomes 0.0014, and then it is really 0.001 because of how the measurements were taken for the angle. It is then rounded to 0.002 for the rocket that is to be launched because the launch rocket although is similar in design is slightly bigger and have a larger surface area.

Numerical Model
To find the predicted height of a rocket, multiple equations must be used. This is called numerical iterations where one must solve individual equations one at a time to find a final

4 5

Photo of rocket in wind tunnel at sight angle Image of the Honey Comb Design that is used to guides air.

answer. The multiple equations that were used in this lab were: Average Thrust, Drag Force, Average Net Force, Initial Velocity, Final Velocity, Average Velocity, Initial Height, and Final Height. This is done out by hand at first to make sure that one could understand what would be going on when one entered it into an excel spread sheet that had all the equation put in and just need the correct data to be put in. The first thing to be found was the Average Thrust. The Average Thrust is found by using (Thrust1 + Thrust2 ) / 2 = ThrustAvg. In this case Thrust1 is the amount of thrust that the engine was exerting during the previous .01 second as the data for time and thrust exerted is measured in .01 sec. Thrust2 is the amount of thrust that the rocket is exerting in the next interval of seconds. The average is calculated by adding the two and then dividing by 2. The Drag Force is the next equation to be solved in the series of equations. To solve for Drag Force the equation Fdrag = kd*V2. In this equation kd is the Drag Coefficient of the rocket and this was found in an earlier part of this lab and was around .002. The Velocity used is the Final Velocity from the previous row of data. For example at Time 0 the Velocity would be 0 because in the previous .1 second it was not moving and does not start moving until the first .1 second of data is recorded. The Average Net Force is then found using the current Average Thrust and the current Drag Force in the Equation ThrustAvg mg Fdrag. The mass of the rocket is found by combining the mass of the rocket and the engine to get just one singular mass not calculating for the mass loss as the rocket fuel is being burned. The mass of the rocket should be measured in kilograms. The Average Net Force is then used to find the Average Net Impulse by taking the average net force and dividing it by the interval between the data, for this lab it is .1 sec. The equation for the Average Net Impulse is Fnet*t. The Initial Velocity is just the final velocity of the previous data set in other words from the previous .1 sec. The Final Velocity was found by adding the Initial

velocity of the current .1 sec and adding the Net Force Multiplied by the change in Time divided by mass or VI+ (Fnet*t/m). The Average Velocity is then found by combining the Initial velocity and the Final Velocity and dividing by 2, VAvg = (VI+VF)/2. The Final Height is then found by multiplying together the Average Velocity and the t and then adding the Initial height that is the previous height that it was before. After doing a couple of rows of this by hand and getting an understanding of the process a spread sheet was then used to do all the mathematics requiring the user to only insert the thrust, the mass of the rocket with engine, and the drag coefficient, kd. Example of the spread sheet is attached to this report showing the numerical results it calculated.6 The maximum height can be found on the spreadsheet by looking at the final height and finding the highest point before the number starts falling again it is also highlighted. The spread sheet can also be used to show how the drag force is important. As it has been stated above Drag Force is equal to the drag coefficient multiplied by velocity squared, and as the spread sheet asks for the drag coefficient with this the Drag force can be set to Zero by putting a Zero in the Coefficient. Since the Drag force becomes Zero it no longer affects the Average Net Force making the Average Net Force equation just ThrustAvg mg making it eventually just a constant mg when thrust is gone as supposed to (mg + Fdrag) which will increase to a large negative number before getting close to zero again. Also because the Average Net Force is so small when it reaches the point when it is just mg it does not affect the final velocity as much allowing the rocket to climb higher, about Two times or more, than it wouldve if there was an drag force because of the rate that the Final velocity decreases at. An example of this is also included as well.
6

Note that the spreadsheet also does not factor in the fact that mass is loss while fuel is being burned

Table of Sample Predicted Heights of Rockets (Both have an approximated kd of .004) Engine Type A8 0.015 kg B6 0.018 kg C6 0.024 kg Rocket 1 0.065kg 17.23 meters 30.85 meters 63.47 meters Rocket 2 0.078 15.13 meters 29.19 meters 61.57 meters

Flight Results
To collect the height of a rocket that was launched, a protractor was used to measure the angle the rocket made with the person measuring and how far it was off the ground. The distance from the person and the launch pad was known and was about 50 meters. To find the angle, the protractor had a string and a weight attached to the string so that as the protractor moved up the string aligned up with an angle. Since the 90 mark on the protractor is perpendicular to the ground 90 is subtracted from the angle measured. By using the angle measure and the known distance one can figure out the height by using tangent as Tan() can be defined as Opposite side over Adjacent side. Using that relationship the Opposite side can be found by multiplying both sided by the distance of the Adjacent side to get Tan() * Adj = Opp. Opposite is the height of the Rocket while the Adj is the distance from the launch pad.

For this lab three people with protractors were used. The reason for using three people is in case the rocket moves toward, away, or veers to the side of the person measuring with the protractor. If the rocket were to move in their direction the angle that would be collected not help get an accurate height of the rocket. The three people were put so that the three made an equilateral triangle with the measurers forming the corners. Within the triangle the launch pad was placed in the middle. The data that is collected in this method is not exactly perfect because it is eyeballed and this is susceptible to human error. A more accurate way to collect the height is to put an altimeter in to the nose cone of the rocket to collect the altitude. However, because an altimeter was not available to use and also being expensive, the method mentioned above was used to collect the data. The three angles that are measured are then averaged to get a better more probable result. A problem that occurs with this method is that if the rocket goes above the person who is measuring, head causing the angle that is measure being larger than 90 beyond the measurable amount with the protractor. During the process of finding the height of the rocket the height of the person measuring must also be counted for. This is because the person who is measuring the angle does not have their eye level with the ground. To account for this a persons height was accounted for later on by adding the distance from their eye to the ground and changing the equation to account for it. The new equation is now Tan() * Distance from Launchpad + Distance eye is from the ground. The data collected for this lab will be shown in a table below with the entire math done out with the calculated height of the rocket at the end compared to the predicted height. In the table the average angle was done by averaging the numbers given by adding them up and dividing by three with some exception because the angles were larger than 90 and are divided by two only.

The heights that the eyes were off the ground were found to be 1.7 meters and are added in to the calculated height already in the table below. Engine and Rocket A3 Small White Angle 1 30 Angle 2 34 Angle 3 25 Average Angle 29.6 or 30 Calculated Height (Meters) 30.7 or 31 With Significant Figures 478 480 With Significant Figures 259 260 With Significant Figures 189 190 With Significant Figures 166 160 With Significant Figures 478 480 With Significant Figures Predicted Height (Meters) 23.22 23 With Significant Figures 63.47 63 With Significant Figures 61.59 62 With Significant Figures 72.97 73 With Significant Figures 49.55 50 With Significant Figures 97.34 97 With Significant Figures

C6 Red / Silver

87

89

75

83.6 or 84

C6 Black and Red

88

<90

70

79

C6 Big White

75

75

<90

75

B6 Red and Yellow

78

77

65

73.33 or 73

C6 Red and Yellow

<90

88

80

84

Conclusion
The reasons for the large difference in most of the predicted vs. the actual is because the predicted is for when the rocket goes straight up, however it does not account for the loss of weight when the fuel is being burned however this only has a slight effect on the rocket. The actual is also a lot off because the rocket does not travel in a straight path up and did curve while in the air going toward the people who were measuring some of the time causing the distance between them and the rocket to shrink or grow depending on the direction. There is also the fact

that the people who were measuring the data also adjusted their head to look at the rocket which also made the distance between them and the rocket increase. Refer to the chart above for comparisons. As mentioned before a suggestion to get better more accurate results would be to use an altimeter.

Reflection
During the process of this lab I learned multiple things. One thing that I learned in the process of the lab was Drag Force. Before e this lab I only knew the term but not really what to associate it to. I also learned how to calculate it out. We ran into a few problems during the process such as collecting the angle during the launch day though there was nothing we really could have done about it. A problem that turned out to be to our advantage was when we measured the force exerted by the engine which caused our data points to be collected every .02 sec instead of .1 which gave us the possibility to use more points than needed. When I think about how we did this lab report I like how we spent time in doing this and how much fun it was though not so much the lab writing part.

Random Pictures (Taken by Teyanna Myers)

Finding Fdrag Fx = max Fx = 0 Tsin + - Fdrag = 0 + Fdrag + Fdrag Tsin = Fdrag Tsin = Fdrag mgsin/cos = Fdrag mgtan = Fdrag Fy = may Fy = 0 Tcos + - mg = 0 +mg +mg Tcos = mg cos cos T = mg/cos

Finding Kd Fdrag =KdV2 V2 V2

Fdrag/V2 = Kd Impulse-Momentum Theorem Impulse = Force * time Impulse = mass * acceleration * time Impulse = mass (V/t) * time
Impulse = Mass * V Impulse = Mass * (Vf - Vi) Impulse = Pf - Pi Impulse = P Mass multiplied by Velocity is equal to momentum

Force is also = to mass multiplied by acceleration so Acceleration is also defined as V over t Assuming that initial time is zero t and t are the same