Lesson: Hovercraft Racers
Posted on July 3rd, 2011 by Mary Lord
Understanding how friction works helps engineers design moving objects so they can be controlled. In this activity, students in grades 7 – 9 gain first-hand experience on how friction affects motion by building a hovercraft that uses air from a balloon to levitate a craft made from a compact disc (CD).
Filed under: Grades 6-8, Lesson Plans | Comments Off on Lesson: Hovercraft Racers
Tags: Class Activities, friction, hovercraft, Lesson Plan, Physics
An Austrian engineering firm debuted a new type of hovercraft at the Paris Air Show, claiming it can take off and land vertically without using any rotor blades or fixed wings. Popular Science’s report says the Austrian Innovative Aeronautical Technology’s (IAT21) D-Dalus uses four contra-rotating turbines for propulsion, allowing “thrust to be fired in any direction, around any axis.”
