It's About Time C

[Science Zone]

Can i get a practice test for It's about time. thanks in advance

[Primate]

Here's the best I've got: http://www.scioly.org/wiki/2009_Test_Ex ... About_Time

[Melkor6000]

Here's an idea that my school might end up using at states.

A Stirling Engine converts ambient heat into kinetic energy in a flywheel via volumetric changes in a cylinder, and a temperature differential between a hot and a cold chamber. If you built a Stirling engine (very precisely, or course, since they are notoriously persnickety to build) and embedded the cold chamber in a cooler of ice, and focused a parabolic mirror onto the hot chamber, the resulting difference in temperature should be enough to get things moving. All you'd need to do was come up with a way to gear it down to read the time more accurately. So essentially, you'd impound a camp oven and a cooler of ice : )

Any thoughts?

[rockhound]

Here's an idea that my school might end up using at states.

A Stirling Engine converts ambient heat into kinetic energy in a flywheel via volumetric changes in a cylinder, and a temperature differential between a hot and a cold chamber. If you built a Stirling engine (very precisely, or course, since they are notoriously persnickety to build) and embedded the cold chamber in a cooler of ice, and focused a parabolic mirror onto the hot chamber, the resulting difference in temperature should be enough to get things moving. All you'd need to do was come up with a way to gear it down to read the time more accurately. So essentially, you'd impound a camp oven and a cooler of ice : )

Any thoughts?

When you say "camp oven" are you refering to the parabolic mirror or something else? Can a parabolic mirror heat something from flourescent lights?

[Melkor6000]

Here's an idea that my school might end up using at states.

A Stirling Engine converts ambient heat into kinetic energy in a flywheel via volumetric changes in a cylinder, and a temperature differential between a hot and a cold chamber. If you built a Stirling engine (very precisely, or course, since they are notoriously persnickety to build) and embedded the cold chamber in a cooler of ice, and focused a parabolic mirror onto the hot chamber, the resulting difference in temperature should be enough to get things moving. All you'd need to do was come up with a way to gear it down to read the time more accurately. So essentially, you'd impound a camp oven and a cooler of ice : )

Any thoughts?

When you say "camp oven" are you refering to the parabolic mirror or something else? Can a parabolic mirror heat something from flourescent lights?

Well, that's one thing we're going to test, whether a arabolic mirror can be focused on a 60 or 70 Watt bulb at several feet and have a noticeable difference. It could be that the ice itelf is enough

[walkingstyx]

That idea sounds incredibly cool, but not especially good at keeping time. It sounds as though ambient temperature differences could have a huge impact on how well this clock worked, not to mention how difficult it would be to build and the likelihood of it being destroyed in travel. Awesome ideas are fun, but only if they work well. If your goal is to win, I would suggest going with a simple natural harmonic oscillator and calibrating it to death. Our device for Nats last year was a pendulum and Troy's (the winners) was an oscillating spring. Both were very simple, but their operators knew them well enough to keep virtually perfect time. Also, simple devices tend to travel better. Our pendulum survived a car wreck on the way home from State, while some of our complex devices can hardly handle being picked up in the classroom.

[Paradox21]

We had our regional competition on Saturday in Minnesota (not the most competitive state) and I got to see the raw scores for the event and I was amazed at the scores for the time trials. There were at least 5 teams within a 48/50 for the trials. The deciding part really seemed to be the test. Out team got 5th in the time trials with a low 48 score (48.3 I think) but got 1st overall because we did well on the test. As far as I know all of the designs were relatively simple pendulums.

[texan92]

That idea sounds incredibly cool, but not especially good at keeping time. It sounds as though ambient temperature differences could have a huge impact on how well this clock worked, not to mention how difficult it would be to build and the likelihood of it being destroyed in travel. Awesome ideas are fun, but only if they work well. If your goal is to win, I would suggest going with a simple natural harmonic oscillator and calibrating it to death. Our device for Nats last year was a pendulum and Troy's (the winners) was an oscillating spring. Both were very simple, but their operators knew them well enough to keep virtually perfect time. Also, simple devices tend to travel better. Our pendulum survived a car wreck on the way home from State, while some of our complex devices can hardly handle being picked up in the classroom.

Did your pendulum have an escapement?

[Jazzy09]

We had our regional competition on Saturday in Minnesota (not the most competitive state) and I got to see the raw scores for the event and I was amazed at the scores for the time trials. There were at least 5 teams within a 48/50 for the trials. The deciding part really seemed to be the test. Out team got 5th in the time trials with a low 48 score (48.3 I think) but got 1st overall because we did well on the test. As far as I know all of the designs were relatively simple pendulums.

lololol that is not true

[Flavorflav]

We had our regional competition on Saturday in Minnesota (not the most competitive state) and I got to see the raw scores for the event and I was amazed at the scores for the time trials. There were at least 5 teams within a 48/50 for the trials. The deciding part really seemed to be the test. Out team got 5th in the time trials with a low 48 score (48.3 I think) but got 1st overall because we did well on the test. As far as I know all of the designs were relatively simple pendulums.

lololol that is not true

Do you mean that they didn't have their regional competition Saturday, or that it wasn't in Minnesota?