For our hybrid designed car my group which consisted of me Joe Malliaras, Griffan Leland, and Zack Roesler had to construct a car that goes exactly five meters with a 250 kilogram weight. To start our projects we brainstormed all possible power sources and came up with spring power. With a little more research we began to build our first prototype. It failed pretty badly and after we looked at it more and researched more we found that we needed to make the spring spread out over a longer distance. So we took of the front wheel and extended it forward. When we finish we tested it and it was more than bad. It only went about two meters and stopped. We were extremely disappointed and knew that we had to make a new one with in a day. So we went to work. We made one stable deck with support beams and a triangar structure on top witch make the spring travel farther. When we finally finished it work perfectly. It was awesome.
Physics concepts use
Potential Energy - The maximum amount of energy stored in an object. This transfers into kinetic energy which in the real world is much lower. The formula for potential energy is PE=mass x gravity x height. In our project the spring on our car had potential energy.
Kinetic Energy - The energy that an object has due to its motion. The formula is KE=1/2mass x velocity squared. On our car the potential energy of the spring was transferred into kinetic energy.
Velocity - the speed of an object in a given direction. the formula is V = distance over time. our car had a velocity moving forward.
Acceleration - The change of velocity in a given direction. The formula is A =the final velocity minus the initial velocity over time. our car increased its acceleration at the beginning and decreased at the end.
Thermal Energy - The amount of energy that is released including friction. The more thermal energy given out the less efficient the object is.
spring constant - The flexibility of an object. The father you stretch the object the more potential energy it will have.
Reflection
During this project I think that my group worked really well together and maybe even to well. We would often find our selfs of topic and talking about random things. I think my group was really good at being resilient and never giving up. I learned that battery powered engines are really inefficient. I think that we could have stayed on task more and worked more on our presentation. In the end we came together, did a good job and finished strong.