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Using Newton's Law of Motion To Explain How Rocket Work PDF
Using Newton's Law of Motion To Explain How Rocket Work PDF
Using Newton's Law of Motion To Explain How Rocket Work PDF
N E W S L E T T E R
Page 1
Issue #106, July 3, 2003
P E A K O F F L I G H T
A P O G E E R O C K E T S PAGE 2
Page 2
Issue #106, July 3, 2003
P E A K O F F L I G H T
freely.
Newtons Laws Newtons Second Law Explained!
Continued from page 2
The second law is simply stated that Force is equal to
has been simplified to: for every action there is always an mass times acceleration. This is the basic mathematical equa-
opposite and equal reaction. What does this mean? When tion that is stated as:
you push on something, it pushes back on you with an equal F=mXa
amount of push. For example, if you push on a the trunk of a The equation can be rearranged in another way:
large tree, it creates a force that pushes back on you. What a = F/m
happens if you push harder? The tree pushes back harder. According to this law, a unbalanced force on an object
If the tree was smaller and couldnt push as hard, your causes it to accelerate. The unbalanced force is an amount of
excess force would cause it to bend over. On the other hand, force greater than the object can produce on its own re-
what would happen if the tree pushed back harder than you member the example of pushing on a small tree trunk. The
were pushing it would push you over. direction that the object will accelerate is in the same direc-
Another classic example of the third law is a person get- tion as the unbalanced force, and the magnitude of the accel-
ting out of a small row boat. In this example, the boat has a eration is equal to the unbalanced force divided by the mass it
mass less than the person in it. The person is next to a pier, is acting on.
and wants to get out of the boat. So he stands up in the boat Newtons second law applies to rocketry in two ways.
and jumps toward the pier. In the third law, the jumping is First, if we apply a force to the rocket, it will accelerate. This
called an action. The boat responds to that action by traveling force in rocketry is called the thrust of the rocket engine.
some distance in the opposite direction. The boats opposite The greater this force, the faster the rocket will accelerate.
motion is called a reaction. This is why you will notice that if you plot out the accel-
When the distance traveled by the person and the boat are eration of the rocket, the curve will have a similar shape to
compared, it would appear that the boat had a much greater that of the Thrust-curve plot (see Figure 2).
reaction than the action of the jumper. This is not the case. The acceleration is also affected by the mass of the rocket.
The reason the boat has traveled farther is that it has less mass A small, light weight rocket will accelerate faster than a large,
than the jumper. This concept will be explained later in a dis- heavy rocket if the same thrust force is applied in both situa-
cussion of the second law. tions. This is the simple application of the equation listed above.
The application of this law to rocketry is that it takes an
(continued on page 4)
unbalanced force to make a rocket move. In space where there
is no air friction, the result of a molecule of gas coming out Simulation Plot
Launched with [C6Q-3 ]
the nozzle of a rocket is that the nozzle must move away from
the molecule of gas. This allow the rocket to accelerate slightly 12.5
7.5
air for them to push against. The answer to this question comes 0.0
from the third law. Imagine the row-boat again. On the water, 18.75
the only part that air plays is the motion of the jumper and the
Acceleration Gee's
boat is to slow them down (the same with the water). Moving 12.50
The surrounding air and water only impede the action- Burnout Ejection Apogee
reaction. 0.00
0.00 1.25 2.50 3.75 5.00 6.25
As a result, rockets actually work better in space than Time
A P O G E E R O C K E T S
Page 3
Issue #106, July 3, 2003
P E A K O F F L I G H T
and the cannon must be different because the masses are dif-
Newtons Laws ferent. The ball will be accelerated faster because the mass of
Continued from page 3 the cannon ball is smaller than the mass of the cannon barrel.
Applying this principal to a rocket, replace the mass of
the cannon ball with the mass of the gases coming out the end
m of the nozzle, and the mass of the cannon with the mass of the
a m F a rocket itself. The force that started the action-reaction is that
pressure created by the controlled explosion taking place in-
side the rockets motor. This pressure accelerates the gases
one direction, and the rocket in the other.
m(rocket) X a(rocket) = m(gasses) X a(gasses)
Because the gas has such a small mass, it must be accel-
erated at a high rate. Similarly, the large mass of the rocket
Figure 3: The explosive force inside accelerates
means it will be accelerated at a slow rate.
both the cannon ball and the cannon.
The rocket example differs from that of the cannon in
Equally importantly, Newtons second law can also be that the explosion within the rocket motor continues for a long
used to explain how the thrust of a rocket is created. An ex- time, while the cannon it occurs only once, and only for a
ample of how this principle is explained can be done by look- brief instant. Additionally, the mass of the rocket is becoming
ing at a cannon firing a cannon ball. smaller as it burns propellant to create the explosion. This
The force in this example is produced by the burning of means that the equation is changing constantly as the rocket
the gunpowder inside the barrel of the cannon. It burns so fast motor burns propellant.
that it is called an explosion. This explosion pushes the ball In the rocket equation, the mass of the gasses coming out
out the open end of the barrel, and at the same time it pushes the nozzle is nearly constant, as is their acceleration. That
the larger cannon backward a short distance. This movement means because the mass of the rocket on the other side of the
of the cannon is in accordance to the third law that there must equation is constantly decreasing, its acceleration must be in-
be a reaction to the ball traveling out the forward end of the creasing. This is the reason why a rocket starts off moving
barrel. slowly and goes faster and faster as it climbs higher into the
The force acting on the ball and the cannon is the same, air.
because it was caused by the same explosion, so in mathemati- I hope that you can now see that Newtons 2nd Law ex-
cal terms: plains how thrust is created.
Fgas = F rocket
m gas X a gas = m rocket X a rocket
Figure 4: The energy from burning the propellant accelerates both the rocket and the exhaust gases.
A P O G E E R O C K E T S
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Issue #106, July 3, 2003
P E A K O F F L I G H T
opposite direction of the thrust (or action) of the motor (third
Newtons Laws law).
Continued from page 4 Finally, if you are a teacher, and youd like some class-
room demonstrations to visually show each of Newtons 3 laws
you are burning the mass of propellant inside the rocket mo- of motion, I highly recommend the book: Teaching Science
tor to produce gas, the amount of gas coming out the nozzle Through Model Rocketry by Tony Wayne. It has 24 visual
will increase. The third way is to increase the acceleration of demonstrations you can easily perform; each one will make
the gasses coming out of the nozzle. you look like a magician. You can find out more information
These topics are discussed in the book: Model Rocket on the Apogee web site at:
Propulsion. I hope that youll buy a copy and see how the http://www.apogeerockets.com/teaching_science.asp
thrust changes when these three factors change. For more in- About the Author:
formation, see the Apogee web site at:
Tim Van Milligan is the owner of Apogee Components
h t t p : / / w w w. a p o g e e r o c k e t s . c o m /
(http://www.apogeerockets.com) and the curator of the rock-
mod_rocket_propulsion_bk.asp
etry education web site: http://www.apogeerockets.com/edu-
Conclusion cation. He is also the author of the books: Model Rocket De-
To summarize, Newtons laws control how a rocket oper- sign and Construction, 69 Simple Science Fair Projects with
ates. An unbalanced force must be created to change the Model Rockets: Aeronautics and publisher of the FREE e-zine
rockets speed or direction (first law). The amount of force newsletter about model rockets. You can subscribe to the e-
created is determined by the mass of the gasses being burned zine at the Apogee Components web site, or sending an email
in the rocket motor and how fast that they are expelled out the to: ezine@apogeerockets.com with SUBSCRIBE as the sub-
nozzle of the motor (second law). And, finally, the motion or ject line of the message.
reaction to the force being produced, is equal to and in the
A P O G E E R O C K E T S
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