February 28, 2011 marks the first day of our rocket launching experiments. With Ian out sick, I had to complete the first launch by myself, unfortunately. I started off by placing the two stakes that were going to hold up the rocket, in the ground. After I had done that I attached the bike pump to the air tube that would pump air into the bottle. Then, I filled about a quarter of the bottle with water and plugged it with the plug connecting to the tube. After clamping, the bottle in order to hold it in place, I pumped the bottle with air and then released the clip to let it fly. The rocket flew into the air but not straight up, and on its way down, the rocket spiraled. From the picture shown above, I learned that this is because there is no center of mass in the bottle as of now. Therefore, the rocket will spiral. With a center of mass, the rocket will fall on the side holding the mass. Hopefully, I will be able to incorporate that in the future rocket designs.
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