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Question: WHICH OF THE FORCES IS THE GREATEST IN ORDER TO MAKE A ROCKET FLY?
A. Air friction. B. Thrust. C. Gravity.
Answer: The correct answer is B. On earth, a rocket is governed three forces: thrust which provides lift, gravity and air friction. Thrust is the greatest of the forces for rocket flight and if the guidance system steers properly, the rocket takes off. The rocket's flight is governed by Isaac Newton's third law of motion- action and reaction.
Experiment #35............
THE BALLOON ROCKET
MATERIALS: A balloon
WHAT TO DO: 1. Simply blow up the balloon. Then, holding it between you thumb and forefinger, let it go and watch it fly.
EXPLANATION: You already know that the air escaped from the opening in which you blew up the balloon. You also noticed that the balloon flew in the opposite direction - this is action and reaction. The first force, air escaping, is the action. The balloon moving in the opposite direction of the air is the reaction.
We use this principle everyday. We push down on a chair to get up. We push our feet to the back to walk forward. A basketball pushes down onto the floor just before it bounces. You can probably think of many other examples.
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION: Once a rocket is in space, there are only two forces acting on it- gravity and thrust. There is no air in space to speak of and gravity is pulling on it in space.
Once a rocket settles into its orbit, the engines are turned off. What causes it to move now is what we talked about earlier,"inertia" (objects in motion try to stay in motion). Without air friction there is nothing to slow it down. Adjust- ments in direction are made by small rocket engines on the sides of the rocket.
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