PAU HANA Auuueeeeeee!

I can't believe that tomorrow will be the last day of physics, the past six weeks seem to have gone by crazy fast. We've learned so much and had so much fun doing it. Mr. Blake's one of the best teacher's I've ever had for realz cuzin.
Physics is the study of the real world. Physics can be used to explain pretty much everything in our lives how it works and why it happens. You can't escape physics because it's all around you everything you see, feel, hear, EVERYTHING is physics.
I thought this class was definitely one of the most interesting classes I've ever taken and I had a lot of fun! Wait no I mean I didn't not have a lot of fun...
I learned a lot, each unit was new and exciting information that at sometimes seemed so simple at at others seemed impossible to understand. I learned about all sorts of different things that effect us in everyday life, things that I had never thought of or known to be physics before. Things like gravity, forces, acceleration, different forms of energy, etc... But from pendulums to light everything was always entertaining and was presented in a way that was easy to understand.
I liked how through the chaos we were able to learn so much about some pretty complex topics. Also Mr. Blake and Mr. Ueki........lol always made sure to wait 5 seconds incase we had a question and presented the units in ways that made everything easy to understand.
I actually wouldn't change anything about this class I think it was one of the best classes I've ever taken. Mr. Blake really knows what he's doing and I think his charisma really adds to the class and makes it crazy fun for everyone.
Mr. Blake you were a great teacher I wish u taught at Punahou so I could have you again! Thanks so much for making this summer awesome!

T-Park (8:30 Krew) Meh! Tom-Jah & Justin

A pretty fun table overall i've had a great summer with you guys!

Images!

Today we learned about images with mirrors and lenses. We learned about a whole bunch of characteristics. A real image is when light converges at one point, a virtual image is when light does not converge at an image, the image will apear inside of a mirror or lens. Upright is right side up while inverted is upside down in relation to an object. Also magnified is zoomed while reduced is zoomed out. We also learned about refraction which is changes in light due to changes in medium.

This is a picture of me wearing glasses which are lenses that change light and that allow me to see! In order to see something the light needs to bounce off of it and go back to your eye. An eye ball is a round lens or a converging lens. Converging lenses like glasses shift light from different directions so that the light will all converge at the exact point in your eye so that you can see. This bending is known as refraction or the changes in light due to changes in medium so when you change the medium (glasses) it allows the light to be directed into that perfect spot!

Light Waves

Today we learned about light waves and got to play around with fun lasers. Light is the only thing we see and if the light waves don't hit you eyeballs you cannot see. We learned about the electromagnetic spectrum which is how different types of light waves are organized. From lowest frequency and longest waves to highest frequency and shortest waves goes: 1. radio waves + TV waves 2. Microwaves 3. Infra-Red 4. Visible Spectrum 5. Ultraviolet (UV) Radiation 6. X-Rays + Gamma Rays. I finally learned why the sky and ocean are blue. The sky is blue because of the scattering of light in the upper atmosphere while the ocean is blue because it absorbs red wavelengths. I kinda got confused at the end of the day when we learned about reflection. The law of reflection states that the angle of insidence will equal the angle of reflection relative to the normal. There are two types of reflection, specular (the image is the same as the object) and diffuse (when light is spread out).

We also learned about the primary colors of light which are red, green, and blue, white light which is the combination of all light colors, and shadows which are the absence of light. We made a color wheel which inclues green, red, blue, yellow (greed+red), magenta (red+blue), cyan (green+blue), and white (green+red+blue). Complementary Colors are 2 colors that when added together make white (they're opposite on the color wheel). That's why in the picture below of The Common Kings at The MayJah RayJah there are different color lights lighting the stage. Mr. Blake mentioned in class that often onstage performances have lightings of different colors because when all of the different colored lights combine they make white light. They have to make sure the proportions of light are just perfect though because otherwise the resulting light will have a tint and won't be white.

Electromagnetic Waves

Today we were briefly introduced to unit 10 which is electromagnetic waves and light behavior. Electromagnetic waves are transverse waves and are made up of 2 components, electric and magnetic. Electric waves move vertically while magnetic waves move horizontally. Electromagnetic waves also travel at the speed of light which is 3 x 10^3 m/s. Light is the only thing we see and sound is the only thing we hear, so inorder to see an object light has to bounce off of it and come back to your eyeballs, the same is true with sound.

This is a picture of my cousin and I at a very green hotel in Tokyo. During the day the hotel uses the natural light from the sun and cross ventilation to light and cool their lobby. The walls are made of tons of pieces of glass which is transparent which means that waves are able to travel through it. In this case the light waves are able to travel through the glass to light the lobby. However if the walls were opaque, or (light) waves weren't able to travel through it the lobby would be very dark durring the day because no light waves from the sun would be able to get through the walls.

More Waves!

We got more into waves and learned about sound waves! We learned that sound waves are specific kinds of waves (longitudinal waves (areas of compression and refraction)) and that sound waves need a medium to go through. All sound travels at the same speed relative to temperature. So if the temperature is hotter sound waves will travel faster and if the temperature is colder sound waves will travel slower. A good example of this concept is that on the mainland the speed of sound is about 340 m/s but here in Hawaii where it's warmer the speed of sound is about 343 m/s. We also learned about three main key concepts. First, refraction or the changes in wave direction and speed due to changes in medium. Second, natural frequency or the frequency an object will vibrate with after an external disturbance. Finally third, resonance or the increase in amplitude or oscillation or an electric or mechanical system exposed to a periodic external force whose frequency is equal to or some multiple of the natural frequency.

This is a picture from a scrapbook from when my family went on a trip to Florida in the summer when I was in about 5th grade. It was crazy because pretty much everyday just when it started to get dark huge thunder and lightning storms would role in and there'd be huge flashes and sounds everywhere. We see lightning before thunder because the speed of light is faster than the speed of sound, so you can estimate how far away the lighting is touching the ground by counting the number of seconds between the time you see the lighting and when you hear the thunder. The general rule is that every three seconds equals about one kilometer and five seconds equals about 1 mile.

Waves!

Today we learned about waves and of course the obvious example is the beach! We live in Hawaii and we're surrounded by waves which are transfers of energy but not material. Waves are also wiggles or vibrations in time ans space. Waves can be broken down into parts, the high point of a wave is known as the crest, the low point of a wave is known as the trough, and the distance from equilibrium to the crest of trough of the wave is known as amplitude. We also learned about wavelength (λ) or the length of a wave. So for example, the distance between two crests or two troughs would be the wavelength of a wave. I also learned how to find the velocity of a wave (velocity = frequency x λ). Frequency is how frequently a wave will come by (cycle/second or Hertz (Hz)). So if you're at the beach you find the frequency of the waves by counting how many waves go by in one second. Then multiply that by the wavelength of the waves and you'll be able to find the velocity of the waves.

This is a picture of Trek and I at da beach check out the waves! I never thought about it but we learned that two waves can be at the same place at the same time. When waves interfere with each other it's either with constructive interference, where the waves add together or destructive interference where they subtract from each other or cancel out.

Blast Off!

           

Today we began our final day of rocket launching. We finally perfected our rocket design and were able to get a 10 second rocket!

Day 1: The first couple of days we did a lot of practice launches. The first day was just with a bottle learning about fuel (water).

Day 2: On day two we attached another bottle to the top of the body of our rocket which made the rocket more stable. We added a cone for the nose of the rocket which helped it go higher. We also added fins which helped with the stability of the rocket. Finally we tried added a parachute which sort of worked.

Day 3: Today we attached new fins which were stronger because we covered them in boxing tape. We made a new parachute which consisted of two parachutes attached together and then to the bottle with string. We also added putty to the inside nose of our cone which helped with stability and helped the rocket go straight. We ended up with an average launch time seven seconds with our max air time being 10.3 seconds!

Materials/Parts of our rocket and reasons why

Cone: We used a regular cone for the nose of our rocket. The cone reduced air resistance on the way up which allowed the rocket to reach its maximum vertical distance.

Putty: We placed putty in the inside tip of the cone which added mass to the cone and helped to make sure that our rocket would come straight down.

Cardboard: We used cardboard to make our wings. The wings help to stabilize our rocket, they catch the wind and help the rocket fly straight.

Parachutes (String & Plastic Bags): We built a parachute using plastic bags and attaching them to the rocket. We ended up having two parachutes one attached to the body of the rocket and then one attached above the first parachute. The parachutes increased air resistance when the rocket was traveling downwards to increase the hang time of our rocket.

Bottles (2L): We used 2 two-liter bottles for the body of our rocket which decreased air resistance traveling upwards which allowed our rocket to reach its maximum vertical distance. We cut the top and bottom off of the top bottle off while we left the bottle bottle completely intact. The longer body of the rocket increased the rockets rotational inertia and made the rocket more stable. This helps our bottle to not spinn our and travel in a straight path.

Tape (Duct & Boxing): We used tape to pretty much attach everything. We attached our two bottles together using boxing tape which make a strong attachment. We also according to Mia "ghetto laminated" our wings which assure they would stay strong and wouldn't get wet. We used duct tape to connect our wings to the body of our rocket which assured that our wings were securely attached to the body of our rocket.

Reflection

This project was very fun but also stressful! The final launch date came at us so fast I kinda freaked out near the end. I learned a lot about the physics that go into a bottle rocket. I learned that the water (fuel) combined with the air pressure from the pump created so much pressure that when released it launched our rocket high into the sky! I learned that things like an elongated body, fins, and putty help to stabilize the rocket during flight. The nose cone helped to decrease air resistance on the way up which increased the maximum launch hight of the rocket. Then things like parachutes helped to increase air resistance on the way down which helped to increases the total hang time of our rocket. I feel SOOOOOO bad because during one of our trials I was pumping the rocket while my partner didn't have the launcher fully in place. It hit him and I still feel so bad even though he said he's ok SORRY TOM! Our ten second launch was crazy when we launched the rocket it went super high then got carried by the wind when the parachutes deployed. It went so far that our rocket actually landed on the sidewalk outside of campus!