Static Electricity

[satreya]

Hello,
I tried to do the experiment as descibed in the project ide: "How Do Different Materials React to Static Electricity", but could not get the aluminum foil ball moved away from the aluminum pie-pan as explained in it. Could you please let me know where I went wrong? Also I kept the styrofoam plate on a wooden table while rubbing it with a balloon or woolen scarf. Not sure if that matters. Could you please guide me to get it working right? I really need this project to be ready by tomorrow (3/3/08) evening for the school science fair. I would greatly appreciate your help on it.

Thank you,
Satya

[barretttomlinson]

Hi,

This question has been answered before, and the advice still applies. See:

https://www.sciencebuddies.org/mentorin ... =31&t=3659

Good luck on your science fair!

Barrett Tomlinson

[donnahardy2]

Hi Satya,

Barrett is right, if it's rainy where you are today, you might not be able to get a static electricity experiment to work. I live where it is damp all winter long, and these static electricity experiments do not work well here. If the electrons you are transferring from one object to another can leak into the moist air, or if you touch the object that is supposed to be holding extra electrons with anything that can conduct electricity, the test object will lose the electrons and the experiment won't work.

I have discovered something else from helping with static electricity experiments. If you have touched the balloon or Styrofoam plate with your hands, these objects will be coated with oil from your hands and this inhibits static electricity. If you start with new items, or if you carefully wash the objects with isopropyl (rubbing) alcohol or any other organic solvent to remove the oil, the static electricity will start flowing. Adults should always be around to help when using solvents like rubbing alcohol.

You live where the weather changes frequently, so if a cold dry wind starts blowing, you will probably be able to do your project and get good results. If it doesn't, then you can still do a completely acceptable science fair project by carefully explaining what static electricity is, describing your experiment in perfect detail so someone else could do the experiment, and by reporting your results. Check your teacher's handout and make sure you have included all of the necessary sections. Make sure you have a bibliography. You don't have any significant results, but you can report that nothing happened. You can take a picture of nothing happening and you can graph three trials of "zero centimeters." Next, you can do an extraordinary job of explaining why nothing happened, and say what you would do next time to improve results. You don't have to apologize about anything, or worry about not having the expected results. Any science fair judge that has experience with static electricity projects will understand, and will give you full credit for trying.

I hope this helps.

Donna Hardy

[satreya]

Thank you Donna and Hardy, for your valuable advices. I did repeat the experiment with precautions this time (wearing sneakers, keeping the pie-pan on a glass) and took the balloon closer to the foil ball (instead of placing the pie-pan on the styrofoam plate - as descibed in the writeup) - and I could see the effect of static electricity. Thanks a lot for the clarifications and for the link that has more details about how to conduct the experiment.
Any ideas on how to measure the distance without touching the pie-pan or the ball with the ruler (as mentioned in the writeup)?

I appreciate all your help.

Satya

[donnahardy2]

Hi Satya,

Congratulations. I'm so happy the experiment worked for you! It's always nice to have results. To measure your results, just hold the ruler about 2-3 inches away and estimate the distance as well as you can. You might have someone else try to measure and average the results. Be sure and explain the difficulty in getting an exact measurement in your discussion/conclusion section of your board.

Donna Hardy