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!

Rockets!

Today we got serious with our rockets Mia, Tom, and I attached two 2L bottles together to create the body of our rocket and added fins. At first we also tried adding a parachute but we couldn't get it to deploy. After many close attempts where our rocket stayed in the air for about 4.78 seconds (just .12 seconds away from the goal of 5 seconds) we knew we had to make some adjustments before our rocket would be ready. We had originally used a simple shopping bag as a parachute but we swapped it out for a trash bag tapped to the inside of our rocket. We launched again and to our amazement our rocket stayed in the air for over 6 seconds and the parachute didn't even deploy. We knew we had to do something to get our parachute working so that we could increase our hang time. The ideal launch would be for the rocket to go as high as possible and then when it slows down at the top of its arch for the parachute to deploy. We changed our parachute again and used one of the trash bags in the classroom. We poked holes in evenly spaced holes on the top of our rocket and attached the parachute to the rocket using string. We then tapped a piece of string from the inside of the nose cone to the bottom of the parachute so that when the rocket went up and the nose cone fell off it would pull out the parachute from the empty upper part of our rocket. We tested it again but sadly it didn't work as well, but our fuel was spilling and we were being rushed inside by Jon, hopefully we'll do more tests tomorrow and we'll be able to get a 10 second rocket!!!

This is a picture of Tom setting up our rocket for a test launch. We have our nose cone on top which is just a cone with the bottom trim cut off. Then two 2L bottles tapped together, the top one cut open on the top and bottom while the bottom bottle is unchanged. We placed our parachute inside the top bottle (the greed bottle). Then finally our fins are tapped and equally spaced around the body of our rocket.

More Unit 8!

Today we did learned more about work and energy and did a little lab on power. Power is the rate at which work is done and is expressed as Power = Work / Time.

This picture is kind of blurry but it's from Itsukushima (Miyajima) Island near Hiroshima, Japan. We were late for our ferry to get to Hiroshima so the guy from the hotel raced us down this steep and winding hill. I thought this was a good example because at the hotel which was on top of the hill we had potential energy and no kinetic energy since we weren't moving. Then when we starting going down the hill we lost potential energy and gained kinetic energy. If I wanted to find out the amount of work the car did I would use the equation, work = force x distance, and since force = mass x acceleration, you would just have to multiply mass by acceleration then multiply that answer by the total distance to find the total amount of work the car did. Then if I wanted to find out how much power was being done by the car I would divide the cars work by the time it took to get down the hill.

Unit 8

On Friday we learned about work and energy. Work is a scalar quantity and is any change in energy. The equation for work is W=F x d or N x m which equals a Joule (J). You need to change position or have distance in order to do work. Energy is the ability to do work, and by the law of conservation of energy, energy cannot be created or destroyed it can only change forms. We also learned about some of the different types of energy such as, Gravitational Potential Energy or the energy an object has due to its position in a gravitational field, Kinetic Energy or the energy of motion, and Spring Potential Energy.

This is a picture of Stonehenge in England. What makes Stonehenge so interesting is that nobody knows how the stones came to be in their current location. The closest place with stones of this size is 30km (18mi) to the North East. These stones traveled a distance with kinetic energy. If the stones were lifted during transport they would have had gravitational potential energy represented by the equation m x g x h.

Egg Drop

I did the egg drop with Sarah Pascual and the both of us had trouble at first with thinking of ideas for our egg drop device. We eventually agreed on surrounding the egg with light sponges, then bubble wrap, and finally placed in a bag filled with shredded news paper and plastic bags. All of our wrappings were used in order to decrease the amount of force exerted on the egg when it was dropped. Since all of our materials were light our device had a low terminal velocity or highest speed. A lower terminal velocity is good because it in turn means a smaller impulse or change in momentum. During the impact with the ground our device has weight force going down due to the pull of the Earth's gravity and normal foce going up due to the Earth pushing up with equal and opposite force to gravity. Our outside trappings might have been a bit too extensive and added unnecessary weight to our device. I think lighter would have been better and if we did it again I would look to make the device as light as possible. I think the light sponges and the bubble wrap might have been enough just by themselves to protect the egg, but if we did it again I would might want to just use more soft sponges and bubble wrap because they're light and provide great protection.

Our completed egg drop device! (thanks for the pic Mr. Blake)

This is a force diagrams that shows the forces acting upon my egg drop device as it hits the ground. Also this is a cross section drawing of my device showing all of the materials used.

More Momentum

In class we learned more about momentum and the conservation of momentum. We did a problem in class that reminded me of air riflery because just like how in the problem the asteroid breaks apart into three pieces when you shoot a pellet it often breaks apart into a lot of pieces. If you could collect all of the pieces and add their momentum together it would equal the momentum from before the pellet broke apart. Although all of the different pieces are all different masses and traveling in different directions the momentum will still be the same because of the law of conservation of momentum which states that momentum in = momentum out.

This is a picture of me shooting at states a couple of years ago, the asteroid example just made me think of a pellet breaking apart after being shot.

Unit 7 Momentum and Collisions

We started Unit 7 today with the main focus on momentum. Momentum(p) is the quantity of motion of a moving body and is measured as the product of its mass and velocity. Momentum can also be defined as the force gained by a moving object, which can be shown by the equation, F=Δp/Δt or average force equals change in momentum over change in contact time.

We also learned about impulse which is the average force upon the object multiplied by the time the force is acting on the object. In other words impulse is the change in momentum.

In class today we also got to toss balloons where we learned that to keep the balloon from breaking you have to move with the momentum of the balloon in order to increase the impact time and decrease force. 

This is a picture of me and my friends at a graduation party. The little kid was moving backwards and we all stopped him slowly, meaning that we had a long impact time since we moved in the same direction that his momentum was already acting in. Since impact time and force and inversely proportional the force on the little kid was very small as we slowed him down very slowly.