Mousetrap powered cars!
Mousetrap powered cars!
Why??
Mousetrap powered cars!
• Physics: Potential and kinetic energies
and kinetic friction.
• Critical Skills: Critical thinking and
organization.
• Life Skills: Quality work, Collaboration
and sportmanship.
Mousetrap powered cars!
• The targeted
knowledge/understanding:
– Understand and predict the transfer of these
energies.
– Recognize the similarity between the
potential energy of a spring and kinetic
energy.
Mousetrap powered cars!
• Calculations from mousetrap cars
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Total Rolling Friction
Coefficient of Rolling Friction
Total Potential Energy
Maximum Total Kinetic Energy
Work Done Moving Car
Gear Ratios
Mouse Trap Spring Constant
Rotational Inertia of Wheels
Mousetrap powered cars!
• Calculations from mousetrap cars (cont)
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Pulling Distance and Gear Ratio
Max Acceleration before Tire Slippage
Predicted Total Travel Distance
Efficiency with Distance Cars
Efficiency with Speed Cars
Center of Mass
Normal force on Wheels
Min String Tension Needed to Move
Calculate Tire Grip on Floor
Mousetrap powered cars!
• Graphing Ideas for mousetrap powered
cars
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distance vs. time
velocity vs. time
acceleration vs. time
pulling force vs. degrees of spring angle
potential energy vs. time
kinetic energy vs. time
Mousetrap powered cars!
• Graphing Ideas for mousetrap powered
cars . (Cont.)
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work vs. time
string tension vs. traveled distance
lever arm length vs. time
lever arm length vs. pulling distance
Mousetrap powered cars!
• I could easily keep you busy on just mouse
trap cars till winter break!!!
Mousetrap powered cars!
• A few of the terms
• Kinetic Energy
– The energy possessed by a body because of its
motion, equal to one half the mass of the body
times the square of its speed.
– KE = 1/2mv2
Mousetrap powered cars!
• A few of the terms
• Potential Energy
– The energy of a particle or system of particles
derived from position, or condition, rather than
motion
– U = mgh, where U is the potential energy in
joules; m, is mass in kilograms; g is the
acceleration of free fall; and h is height in
meters.
Mousetrap powered cars!
• A few of the terms
• Friction
– A force that resists the relative motion or
tendency to such motion of two bodies or
substances in contact.