Science Buddies: "Ask an Expert"

For the science fair, I built a electrostatic generator. I had a problem with the amount of water falling through each inducer, on one side it was more water than the other. Therefore, I couldn't make the water flow 90 mL per minute. Also, it wouldn't produce sparks. I'd appreciate any suggestions to fix these problems.

Hi kimiko_desu,

This is a very interesting project and I hope that it works out ok for you. Are there any differences in the length of one side of your generator dripper compared to the other? If these two lengths are the same and of the same materials, there is no obvious reason that you would be getting a larger flow on one side than the other. As for the sparks, it may take a while to build up enough charge to generate a spark. Make sure to ground everything prior to starting (connect the two inducers and cans to each other). Hopefully this helps and let me know about the length on the dripper.

Best of luck!

mjacobsen