Lots and Lots of Science in FE8B

Hey
So, we learned about our summative in Science. I was right, we are making a hydraulic system. What we have to do is transport 4 cans of toxic liquid from a factory onto the back of a truck. I know this sounds impossible, but we are actually just moving 4 film canisters of water from one side of a desk to a cardboard truck Mr. Foster made on the other side. However, we can't touch the canisters, we have to be well away from the "toxic" area, and just use controls to move the canisters. We can use either hydraulic systems (liquids) or pneumatic systems (gases). Yesterday, we did a workshop to give us an introduction on how these systems work.
First, what we had to do was take two 20mL syringes and attach them with 5 cm of plastic tubing. Then, we put the plunger on one syringe at 20mL (all the way open) and the other plunger all the way down. Then we pushed on the syringe that was open and observed what happened. The other plunger was pushed out to about the 19.5mL mark. I think the reason that the plunger wasn't pushed out exactly the same amount is because the air in the tube was compressed a bit before it exerted the force on the plunger, therefore taking up a lesser volume, but I'm not sure about that.
Next, we set one plunger at 20mL and the other completely in. We pushed as hard as we could on the plunger that was out, but then held the other in place so that it couldn't move. We could push the plunger in to the 5mL mark before the tube connecting the two syringes fell off. This is because the air compressed, but I guess it only could to a certain point and then found a way out of the container, as compressed fluids are always trying to do.
Then, we repeated the two experiments but had a 50cm piece of tubing connecting the syringes instead of 5cm. We had the same results for the first experiment. But, for the second we could press the plunger all the way in. I think this is because there were more particles and a certain amount of force, so there was less pressure than fewer particles and the same amount of force. However, this could have also been because we had different people pushing the plunger in and prevent the other from moving, so something may have varied with that. This could have skewed our results.
We then filled our system with water, and went back to using a 5cm tube. When we pushed on the one plunger, it moved the other plunger exactly the same distance. I guess this is because water is incompressible, so no force was lost compressing it. When we prevented the other plunger from moving, nothing happened; we couldn't push the plunger in. This is because water is incompressible, so we couldn't push the particles together.
The final thing we did was put one 20mL syringe at one end of the system, and a 10mL syringe at the other. We put the plunger in the 10mL syringe out all the way and pushed the 20mL syringe's plunger in all the way. When the system had air in it, the plunger on the 20mL syringe moved out a shorter distance. But, that was just an illusion because it actually moved the same volume of air we pushed in (10mL) but on the larger syringe, it didn't look like it because it was a shorter distance on the syringe scale. This was because the 20mL syringe was wider than the 10mL one. When we did the same thing except with water in the system, the results were the same.
So, that is what we have been doing in Science. I can't wait for our summative - I'm quite excited about it!
Until next Wednesday,
-K