Task: Build an electromagnet fishing rod that is strong enough to lift paper clip "fish." You must include a switch so that your electromagnet can be turned on and off, enabling you to move the paper clips from one place to another. You will use your rod to fish alongside classmates in an Electromagnetic Fishing Derby.
Requirements:
1. The wire must be dangling off the meter stick and measure at least 40 cm.
2. There must be a switch; you may not touch the fish to take them on or off of the rod.
How does it work?
To turn the electromagnet fishing rod on, you need to push the wire from the battery holder onto the wire connecting to the iron nail on the bottom. When you push the wire down and the stripped ends of the wire meet, it makes a complete circuit, which lets the electromagnet work. When there is a complete circuit, the power from the battery will travel through the wires into the iron nail, since the wire is coiled around the iron nail, giving it power.
When it is turned off, you can see that the wire from the battery holder is not touching the wire connected to the iron nail hanging down, so there is an incomplete circuit, and the electromagnet will not work.
Challenges/Problems/Improvements:
In our first try, we coiled the wire around the meter stick, not the iron nail. Therefore, the power from the battery was not going into the iron nail, but was going into the meter stick. Also, we had no switch to turn the electromagnet on and off. Finally, we did not have a complete circuit because of the wires not connecting to each other.
In our second draft, we connected the ends of the wire to the wire from the battery holder. Then, we coiled one end of the wire around the brass paper clips, and coiled the wire around the iron nail to give it power. Next, we put the other end of the wire to the negative end of the battery holder, which we thought would make a complete circuit. This did not work because the power only went to the first brass paper clip. This was caused because the paper clip is not a great electricity conductor. But some improvements were when we actually tried and got closer to make a working switch. Also, we coiled the wire around the iron nail, not the meter stick. We found out that coiling the wire around the meter stick was wrong, because when we made our own electromagnet using a battery and a iron nail, we coiled the wire around the iron nail, not anyplace else.
In our final draft, we connected and taped the positive end of the wire from the battery holder to the wire which coiled around the iron nail. We taped the other end of the wire onto the meter stick. This was our switch. When the negative end of the wire from the battery holder was pressed onto the other end of the wire, it made a complete circuit, letting the electromagnet work. Some thoughts we had was that we could have cut the wire to be shorter, to let most of our power go into the iron nail. But some improvements we had were that we had a complete circuit and a working electromagnet. Also, we taped the wires to keep them in place.
How did we do?
I think we did better in the competition because we were focused more. Also, we had brand new batteries which gave the electromagnet more power.
Images:
When the Electromagnetic Fishing Rod is on. Our Electromagnetic Fishing Rod.
When the Electromagnetic Fishing Rod is off.
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