Your lucky, I had to pick my boss up at 6.30pm, looked at the clock and it was 6.20pm, I had ten miniutes to wash my lunch dishes up hoover the living room and get to her to pick her up, and it takes a man to achive that tell your boss
Right here goes with our experiment.
(no pun intended
)
Materials and Equipment
styro-Foam plate (not important if you don't have one)
styro-Foam cup
Drinking straw (plastic will do)
Clay or kids Plasticine
Aluminum pie pan dish or what ever
Thread (cotton)
Aluminum foil
Masking tape or cellotape (think thats how you spell it
)
Wooden ruler
Several different materials to test (polyester, nylon, cotton, wool, silk, aluminum, saran wrap, plastic, copper, tissue paper, almost anything!) including a backpack
Experimental Procedure
First you will make an electroscope to test for the presence of static electricity in different materials.
The electroscope at rest. the thread with ball will hang straight down.
Make two holes near the bottom of a Styrofoam cup (not plastic) on opposite sides. A good way to do this is by pushing a sharp pencil, chop-stick or skewer through the cup.
Push a plastic straw through the holes in the cup. Push the straw so that it is almost flush with the cup on one side, but sticking out as much as possible on the other.
Stick 4 little balls of clay or plasicine to the rim of the cup, each about 1/2 inch in diameter.
Turn the cup upside down and and stick it to the bottom of the aluminum pie pan using the clay. Make sure that the cup is right at the edge so that the straw sticks out over the edge of the pan.
Cut a piece of thread about 8 inches long and tie a few knots in one end of the thread.
Cut a one-inch square of aluminum foil. Use it to make a ball around the knots in the thread. The ball should be about the size of a marble. It should be just tight enough so it doesn't fall off the thread.
Tape the other end of the thread to the tip of the straw so that the ball of foil hangs straight down from the straw, right next to the edge of the pan.
Tape the straw to the cup so it doesn't move around when you use the electroscope.
To test the electroscope, create some static electricity. An easy way to create static is by rubbing a balloon on a Styrofoam plate or wooly jumper.
When you do this, you "charge" the plate, which means you cause a buildup of electrons on one side. Even though the plate is charged, the electrons don't move because Styrofoam doesn't conduct electrons.
Once you've created some static electricity, place the electroscope on top of the Styrofoam plate. Be sure to hold the electroscope by the foam cup and not the aluminum pan, otherwise it won't work. Electrons move easily through the metal, so when you put the pie pan onto the charged foam plate, the electrons travel into the pan. The added negative charges on the pan repel the negative charges on the foil ball, which moves away from the pan.
When the electroscope is negatively charged, the foil ball is repelled by the foil plate.
You can use a ruler to measure the distance between the foil ball and the pan. The more charge there is, the more distance there will be. Be careful not to touch the ball or the edge of the plate with the ruler when you measure.
Now, touch the ball with your finger. What happens?
Now that you know your electroscope works, you will use it to test the static electricity present in different materials. Between each experiment you will need to discharge your electroscope by touching the pan with your finger or a metal rod. (you won't get a shock, just like you didn't above
Try charging different objects with static electricity and testing them with the electroscope. Good materials to try are plastic wrap(cling film), a comb, different types of fabric, aluminum foil. .
Once you have built it and had a play with it, lay it on your back pack and see if the ball moves? if it does then your backpack contains a charge, you can either earth it, by sticking it on some damp soil in custy's gardens or by the other methods we have mentioned.
If you are charged, try touching the pie dish and see if you get any movement in the ball, keep it in your van, but don't let the custy's see it, or they'll think you've escaped from some were
If all this fails then suicide is your only option
(Only joking don't do it) just get back to me and we'll go another route.