Science Buddies: "Ask an Expert"

Hello, I'm really new to this forum so excuse me if I sound out of the ordinary.

Pretty much at the moment I'm doing a project based off of rude golberg machines, and currently I have to point out energy conversion and how is energy conservation.

One of the stages I'm having issues with is a bowl being filled of with water which rises a small scale ship which causes the ship to hit the end of a wooden spoon.

Can someone please point out the energy conversion and how this may conserve energy?

Thank you very much!

Ah yes, Rube Goldberg. His mythical machines are really fun.

It takes energy to move the water into the bowl. If you're pouring it from a pitcher, you used kinetic energy to raise it, giving the water potential energy. The water then fell, converting the potential back to kinetic. the boat had been attracted to the earth through gravity and the water raised the boat away from the center of the earth giving it some potential energy which isn't used in your description. The boat as it rises has some kinetic energy and hits the spoon, giving the spoon some of that kinetic energy. The other end of the spoon then hits or lifts something and transfers that energy elsewhere.

One thing to remember about conservation of energy is that conversions are never 100% efficient. You always lose something going from one form to another or from one item to another. That loss happens in the form of heat, creation of sound, etc. If you were to make a Rube Goldberg device the efficiencies would be horribly bad but that's not the point of them. They're supposed to be ridiculously over-engineered and that's what makes them fun.

I'm not sure I would have chosen a Rube Goldberg device to demonstrate energy conservation but it's cool that you're looking at them that way.

Howard