Plant Blog Post 1

In class we are doing plant experiments. I wanted to know if I put my plant near the window it would grow better? My hypothesis was that my plant would grow better and be healthier if I put it next to the window because natural light is better than artificial light. My controlled plant has air, water and a big light hanging over it. By putting my manipulated plant by the window it changes the light.

 

Over the first week my controlled plant has grown by a few inches. It is mostly light green and has 4-6 leaves. It has buds. My manipulated plant has only grown by centimeters. It is shorter than my controlled plant. It is mostly light green and brown. It has 3-5 leaves. It doesn’t have any buds.

 

Maglev Day 2

On day 2 of making maglev trains we were even more successful. Here are some things that we did on our final design that helped. Knowing that like poles repel helped us make the train float so we used more magnets to make the train go higher. We placed magnets on each side of the train and the track making sure to line them up so the track and train would repel. Knowing the properties of magnets helped us build the maglev train. We used striped magnets because they repel easily and look like train tracks.

 

Along the way a couple of things failed, one of them is when when we put more magnets onto the track. What happened was the train attracted to the sides of the track. The other failure was when we put 5 magnets onto the track and only 1 on the train. What happened then was the train was way too jumpy. From our failures we learned that making mistakes gets you closer to doing it right. We made a few changes, a change we made was squeezing the box so that the train wouldn’t have and room to flip onto the magnets on the track.

 

I learned some things about the engineering design process. One thing I learned was that it can be frustrating. Another thing I learned was that it never ends! I also learned about teamwork. One thing I learned about teamwork was it is hard to do anything without it. Another thing I learned was that in teamwork you should always talk your ideas out instead of fighting.

 

Maglev Train Day 1

A maglev train is a very fast train. It is so fast because there is only air friction. A maglev train has magnets on both the train and the track. The magnets are like poles so they repel, causing the train to float above the track. My groups first idea was to put a ring magnet on the train and to put 5 ring magnets on the track.

 

Our first idea worked except it was too jumpy. It was too jumpy because some spots had more repulsion than others.Then we tried putting a strip magnet on each side of the track, then put a magnet on each side of our train. We put like poles facing each other to get the train to repel. That idea worked best so we kept it.