How to build a boat

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Introduction: The purpose of the Water Odyssey project was to design and construct a boat that is powered solely by one liter of water and can travel 2.20 meters in the shortest amount of time. The purpose of this report is to explain the physics concepts our group used to design our boat. As in any competition, the Water Odyssey Competition had several rules. The boat could not be any longer than .5 meters and no wider than .3 meters. The boat had to be able to float in .18 meters of water. The boat could only be powered by the water reservoir; no other energy storing devices or pressurized containers were allowed. The refillable water reservoir had to ride in and be attached to the boat. Finally, the boat had to operate independently of any external inputs. Discussion: Our boat was, for the most part, built in one day. We got together and decided that Styrofoam would be the best material for the boat. We chose Styrofoam, because it is light, floats easily, and can be sanded so that it is smooth and there is less friction between the boat and the water. We bought a long sheet of Styrofoam and cut it in half. We then placed one half on top of the other and used rubber cement to glue them together. We did this, because we wanted the water to sit up above the water level so we could use its potential energy to help power the boat. We then cut out a slot for the water bottle to be placed and used wire to secure the bottle in our boat. On our first trial in the bathtub, we found that the water did not come out smoothly; it chugged out of the bottle. This made the boat travel very slowly. In order to let the air escape out of another place than where the water was coming out, we put a small hole in the bottom of the bottle. This made the water come out a lot smoother and made the boat run much faster. We chose to not use any tubing in our boat, because the bottle has a
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