Posts: 3552 Location: India Joined: 29.10.07 Thanks: 9 Thanked 158 times in 107 posts
Posted on 16-08-2008 17:47
a279;120. Water puzzle
Lay a small tray or a wooden ruler over a six-sided pencil and place on it two jars filled with water balanced as on a pair of scales. What happens if you immerse a cork into the water in one jar, while placing a cork of the same size on the water in the other jar! Does one side of the balance become heavier, and if so, which side!
The balance leans to the side where you immerse the cork in the jar. That is, this side increases in weight by exactly as much as the weight of water displaced by the cork. The other jar only becomes as much heavier as the weight of the cork itself.
"To catch me, you gotta be fast...
To beat me, you gotta be strong...
But to be me? Damn, you gotta be kiddin!!!"
Posts: 3552 Location: India Joined: 29.10.07 Thanks: 9 Thanked 158 times in 107 posts
Posted on 17-08-2008 17:37
a279;121. Mysterious water level
Place a half-dollar, ten new pence, or a penny in a matchbox and float it in a glass of water. Mark the level of the water on the side of the glass. Will it rise or fall if you take the coin from the box and lower it into the water! Just think about it first!
The water level falls. Since the coin is almost ten times heavier than water, the box containing the coin also displaces, because of its larger volume, ten times more water than the coin alone. This takes up, in spite of its greater weight, only a small volume and so displaces only a small amount of water.
"To catch me, you gotta be fast...
To beat me, you gotta be strong...
But to be me? Damn, you gotta be kiddin!!!"
Posts: 3552 Location: India Joined: 29.10.07 Thanks: 9 Thanked 158 times in 107 posts
Posted on 18-08-2008 16:39
122. Volcano under water
a279;Fill a small bottle full of hot water and colour it with ink. Lower the bottle by means of a string into a preserving jar containing cold water. A coloured cloud, which spreads to the surface of the water, rises upward out of the small bottle like a volcano.
Hot water occupies a greater volume than cold because the space between the water particles is increased on heating. It is, therefore, lighter and experiences buoyancy. After some time the warm and cold water mix and the ink is evenly distributed.
"To catch me, you gotta be fast...
To beat me, you gotta be strong...
But to be me? Damn, you gotta be kiddin!!!"
Posts: 3552 Location: India Joined: 29.10.07 Thanks: 9 Thanked 158 times in 107 posts
Posted on 19-08-2008 13:36
a279;123. Suspending an egg
Half fill a jar with water and dissolve plenty of salt in it. Now add as much water again, pouring carefully over a spoon so that the two liquids do not mix. An egg placed in the jar remains suspended as though bewitched in the middle. Since the egg is heavier than tap water, but lighter than salt water, it sinks only to the middle of the jar and floats on the salt water. You can use a raw potato instead of the egg. Cut a roundish ‘magic fish’ from it, and make fins and eyes from colored cellophane.
"To catch me, you gotta be fast...
To beat me, you gotta be strong...
But to be me? Damn, you gotta be kiddin!!!"
Posts: 3552 Location: India Joined: 29.10.07 Thanks: 9 Thanked 158 times in 107 posts
Posted on 20-08-2008 18:32
a279;124. Dance of the mothballs
Add some vinegar and bicarbonate of soda to some water in a jar. Toss several mothballs, which you can colour beforehand with a crayon to make the experiment more fun, into the bubbling bath’. After a time the balls dance merrily up and down. Since the mothballs are a little heavier than water, they sink to the bottom of the jar. The carbon dioxide freed by the chemical reaction between vinegar and bicarbonate of soda collects in bubbles on the balls and lifts them slowly to the surface of the water. There the bubbles escape the balls sink again, and the performance is repeated.
"To catch me, you gotta be fast...
To beat me, you gotta be strong...
But to be me? Damn, you gotta be kiddin!!!"
Posts: 3552 Location: India Joined: 29.10.07 Thanks: 9 Thanked 158 times in 107 posts
Posted on 26-08-2008 23:49
a279;125. Pearl diver
Stick a match about one-tenth of an inch deep into a coloured plastic bead and shorten it so that its end floats exactly on the surface of the water when the bead is placed in a milk bottle full of water. Close this with a plastic cap.
By changing the pressure on the cap, the bead can be made to rise and fall as though bewitched. Plastic is only a little heavier than water. The match and the air in the hole of the bead give it just enough buoyancy for it to float. The pressure of the finger is conducted through the water and compresses the air in the bead. Thus it no longer has sufficient buoyancy and sinks.
"To catch me, you gotta be fast...
To beat me, you gotta be strong...
But to be me? Damn, you gotta be kiddin!!!"
Posts: 3552 Location: India Joined: 29.10.07 Thanks: 9 Thanked 158 times in 107 posts
Posted on 27-08-2008 23:31
a279;126. The yellow submarine
Cut a small boat out of fresh orange peel and make portholes on it with a ballpoint pen. Place the boat in a bottle filled with water and close it with a plastic cap, if you press on the cap, the boat rises and falls according to the strength of the pressure. Minute air bubbles in the porous fruit peel make it float. By the pressure of the finger, which is transmitted through the water, the bubbles are slightly compressed, so their buoyancy is less, and the boat goes to diving stations. Since the yellow of the peel is heavier than the white, the submarine floats horizontally.
You can accompany the submarine by several ‘frogmen’. Simply toss broken-off match heads with it into the bottle. They float, because air is also contained in their porous structure. If the air bubbles are made smaller by the transmitted water pressure, the match heads dive deeper too.
"To catch me, you gotta be fast...
To beat me, you gotta be strong...
But to be me? Damn, you gotta be kiddin!!!"
Posts: 3552 Location: India Joined: 29.10.07 Thanks: 9 Thanked 158 times in 107 posts
Posted on 28-08-2008 23:29
127. a279;Bewitched box
Stick a false bottom in a thin cardboard box and hide a lead weight in the space below. You can always balance the box on the corner in which the piece of lead is lying. Each object has a centre of gravity, round which it is held in balance by the force of gravity. In such a regularly shaped object as a box the centre of gravity is exactly in the middle, so your box should fall from the table. The lead weight prevents this, however, by shifting the centre of gravity above the table.
"To catch me, you gotta be fast...
To beat me, you gotta be strong...
But to be me? Damn, you gotta be kiddin!!!"
Posts: 3552 Location: India Joined: 29.10.07 Thanks: 9 Thanked 158 times in 107 posts
Posted on 29-08-2008 23:02
a279;128. The balancing button
If you place a button on a cup so that only the edges are in contact, it will fall off at once. No-one would think that the button would remain on the rim of the cup if you fixed yet another weight on to it. And yet it is possible. If you fix two kitchen forks over the button and then place it on the rim of the cup, it will remain in this position.
The bent fork handles, whose ends are particularly heavy and reach sideways round the cup, move the center of gravity of the button exactly over the rim of the cup, so that the whole set-up is in balance
"To catch me, you gotta be fast...
To beat me, you gotta be strong...
But to be me? Damn, you gotta be kiddin!!!"
Posts: 3552 Location: India Joined: 29.10.07 Thanks: 9 Thanked 158 times in 107 posts
Posted on 30-08-2008 23:53
a279;129. Floating beam
It would not seem possible to balance a clothes peg with one end on the tip of your finger if a leather belt is hung over half the peg. But the force of gravity can apparently be overcome. The whole secret is a small nick, which you cut slantwise in the
piece of wood. The belt, which you squeeze firmly into the nick, leans so far sideways because of its slanting fixing that the center of gravity of wood and belt together is shifted under the tip of the finger and balance is obtained.
"To catch me, you gotta be fast...
To beat me, you gotta be strong...
But to be me? Damn, you gotta be kiddin!!!"
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