Problem: Steam powered car runs well below its potential.
Claim: Significant reduction of unnecessary metal weight in the chassis will greatly improve the acceleration and speed of the steam powered car built in the lab section of ENG 198.
Grounds: The steam powered car has a lot of excess metal whichi s non-vital to its functionality.
Warrant: The power for the propulsion of the steam powered car comes entirely from pressure build up in the boiler caused by the burner, and is not enhanced by the metal surrounding the car.
Backing: Newton's Second Law, F = ma. As the force from the boiler is unchanging between controlled and comparable experiments, the acceleration becomes inversely proportional to the mass of the car. As the mass of the car increases, the acceleration and thus maximum velocity decreases.
Qualifier: Near certain, provided the reduction of chassis does not compromise the structural integrity of the steam powered car.
Dear Charlie,
ReplyDeleteI love how you connected Eng198 lab to the lecture! I agree with you that there was a lot of aluminum for the body that could be cut down. The physics in the backing to your model seems like a very solid point. Decreasing the mass would indeed increase the force the car experiences. Did your group cut down a lot of the excess metal? I hope using the Toulin Model really helped you improve your steam engine car!
-Linna
This is a well developed model. I completely understand the problem and the claim. The warrant, backing, and qualifier are also very appropriate. Whereas my blog post tried to do the same thing using free-flowing natural language paragraph, yours succeeded to present the idea very clearly in a list format.
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