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Boats Afloat

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Sent in by:
Dan of Boston, MA

Create a cash-carrying cargo cruiser!
Materials

Materials Needed


  • aluminum foil
  • pennies

Instructions

Instructions


  1. Construct a boat out of 1 square foot sheet of aluminum foil.
  2. Estimate how many pennies your boat will be able to hold.
  3. Then, float your boat and place as many pennies as you can in the boat before it sinks.
  4. Was your estimate right?




Some of your Results

Warne, age 9 of Aiken, SC wrote:
It worked and it held 69 pennies.

Natalie, age 9 of Aiken, SC wrote:
For my first boat it held 13 pennies beacause the boat was so small. My second boat held 82 pennies because the boat was like a square with the sides folded up. My hypothesis was correct and wrong.

Sara, age 9 of Aiken, SC wrote:
My first boat held 11 pennies and my second boat held 9 pennies. I thought they would hold more. I loved this project!

Nancy, age 9 of Aiken, SC wrote:
My first boat sank, but my second one held 28 pennies. I predicted that it will hold 20 pennies, but it held 28. The best boat design was awesome!

Kristina, age 9 of Aiken, SC wrote:
My boat was 15 by 15 cm. I thought it would hold 6 or 7 so it holds 12 and 24. I am suprised it held that many.

Reid, age 9 of Aiken, SC wrote:
The first time I tested there was weight leaning to the side. The second time the sides were pionting up so when the boat gained weight. The water came over the side.

Zachary, age 9 of Aiken, SC wrote:
it sunk after 55 pennies.

Olivia, age 9 of Aiken, SC wrote:
The first boat I made wasn't very good. It only held 8 pennies. But the second one held more. It held 19 pennies. I'm happy that it held more than 8 pennies.

Andrew, age 9 of Aiken, SC wrote:
it sunk after 10 pennies.

Dessie, age 9 of Aiken, SC wrote:
My first boat held 8 pennies and it did not really work. I thought it would hold 10 pennies. My geuss was close. My second boat held 15 and that was my guess! This was so fun! I got soaken wet! I want to do this again!

Jared, age 9 of Aiken, SC wrote:
my hypothesis was wrong because I thought my boats would hold 20 pennies but they held 15 and 16 pennies.

Simeon, age 9 of Aiken, SC wrote:
On my first try, it held 15 pennies. On my second try, it held 21 pennies. It was a lot of fun.

Tristan, age 10 of Aiken, SC wrote:
The first time my boat held 22 and I guessed it would hold 25. The next time I guessed it would hold 58 I was so close becuase I got 59. I hope we could do it next year because it was sssooo fun. I hope I get to do it. I am so happy that we did it.

Sativa, age 9 of Aiken, SC wrote:
I had 2 15 by 15 boats, the first held 6 pennies, the second held 5 pennies.

Schuyler, age 9 of Aiken, SC wrote:
When I did it my boat held 10 pennies. My boat was the size of 5 mints.

Sierra, age 9 of Aiken, SC wrote:
On my last boat which was 30 by 30 held and ran out of cents by the 85 pennie.

Mike, age 9 of Aiken, SC wrote:
My largest boat that was 30cm by 30cm held 85 pennies. Then I ran out of pennies. It was awsome!!!

Hunter, age 10 of Aiken, SC wrote:
We ran out of pennies when my 30cm by 30cm boat reached 85 pennies.

Annika, age 9 of Aiken, SC wrote:
On my first boat I predicted it would hold about 10 pennies but it only held 8. On my second boat I predicted it would hold a lot of pennies but it only held 2. Making boats is a lot of fun!

Brooke, age 12 of Eden Prairie, MN wrote:
it stade floteing till my littel sis put a dime on it. so 20:00 min.

Jannie, age 11 of Burnaby, BC wrote:
We made it into a box design and it held about 60 pennies.

Stephanie, age 11 of Goldsboro, NC wrote:
It could carry $1.52, but then I ran out of change.

Kayla, age 10 of Waynesboro, VA wrote:
it was alsome. I really like it.

Rebeka, age 12 wrote:
a lot of pennies went on the alumim foil made boat.

Ahmed, age 10 of Tripoli wrote:
It held 550.

Kayla, age 16 of Tacoma, WA wrote:
Well, we are doing it for a class experiment it's called "float my boat" and we've done numerous trials. It actually works very well. We have constructed 3 different shaped aluminium boats and tested how many pennies we could fit. The square shaped ones held the most amount of pennies.

Austin, age 11 of Patriot, OH wrote:
it did notwork verrie well

Jaden, age 10 of Dallas, TX wrote:
I built about 15 boats one being 8 feet long and 2 being seven and various others. my seven foot long boat carried 43 1/64th scale cars, 13 metal airplanes, 5 magnetix builds. and seven dollars worth of coins with some army men also. my eight foot boat hasn't floated yet but it is twice as strong. about twice as wide and various other betters.

Lindsay & Thomas of Thorntown, IN wrote:
we trid to put suff to 100 and see if it flots and it did?


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