Newton's cradles are very addicting. I'm sure anyone who's ever touched one can agree. Basically, when you lift up the first marble, it hits the second, but instead of moving very much, the last marble pops up!
If you'd like to know the reason behind it, it's basically just conservation of momentum. The marbles pass on their momentum once hit, and the last marble has nothing to hit so it swings up. You can use this link if you want to know more.
Anyways, I had a chance to make my own Newton's cradle at a camp, and this is totally the best project so far (though it's only been my second week). Thank you to my teachers to helping me out!
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| Gif courtesy of giphy. This is basically a Newton's Cradle in action. |
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| And here is the cradle I made, under poor photo quality (sorry). It looks a lot better on my desk, but it works everywhere :). |
So that's a Newton's cradle! It took me at least an hour (and a half? I don't really remember), and I had to be very precise when lining everything up (that's where my teacher's help came in). The hot glue also came off after a bit on one of the marbles and on two of the popsicle sticks, but luckily I had tape. I might post a tutorial about this, but probably not, because everything needs to be done super carefully and I don't have any pictures to show of the process. It would probably be a bit confusing without them.
Anyways, that's my handmade Newton's cradle. It works pretty well, but needs to be aligned each time (since the precision needs to be almost perfect for the momentum to be transferred between the marbles). Have you ever made a Newton's Cradle before? Do you want to make one? Tell me below!
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