Match Rockets

Let's look at some background information....

    Isaac Newton, born in Woolsthorpe, England (A.D. 1642-1727), was a mathematician and physicist, and is considered by many to be one of the most important scientists in history. Among his better known contributions are the invention of calculus (also developed independently by the German mathematician Leibniz), his studies of light and optics, and *drum roll* the three laws of motion!  
    Newton was not the first to define motion, but he showed that Aristotle's definition of motion which had been accepted for 2000 years was incorrect.
 

    Aristotle was a Greek teacher and philosopher (384-322 B.C.).  He was a great scholar and one of the fathers of science.  He compiled many of the known data about the world around him into theories which helped explain that world.  His understanding of motion differed from Newton's .

    Aristotle classified two types of motion: natural motion and violent motion.
    Natural motion implied that objects had a place where they wanted to be (such as steam in the air, or a rock on the ground).  Aristotle also concluded that heavier objects strive to that place they want to be faster than lighter objects.  This was something later proven false by Galileo (A.D. 1564-1642).  Natural motion was upward or downward, or, in the case of planets, in a circle.
    Violent motion resulted from a pull or a push, such as throwing a rock, lifting a bucket, or pushing a door.
    There were, however, some flaws with Aristotle's definition of motion.  According to Aristotle something would not move horizontally without a constant pushing or pulling agent.   That implied that a thrown rock would have some agent pushing or pulling it through the air.  Aristotle thought that the air rushing in to fill the space behind the moving rock could provide the necessary push. This is not actually true.  

    While Newton did not develop the three laws overnight, he had formed them by the time he was twenty-three.  From his work on motion, Newton also developed the law of universal gravitation.  These important laws appeared in Isaac Newton's famous book, Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica (Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy) (1687), or simply The Principia.
 

Law 1:

Every object continues in its state of rest or of uniform motion in a straight line, unless it is compelled to change that state by forces impressed upon it.

 

Law 2:

The acceleration of an object is directly proportional to the net force acting on the object, is in the the direction of the net force, and is inversely proportional to the mass of the object.

 

Law 3:

Whenever one object exerts a force on a second object, the second object exerts an equal and opposite force on the first.

Pretty deep stuff, huh.  If you can understand the writing above you truly are on your way to being a scientist.   Well, let's concentrate on the 3rd law which is commonly stated as "for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction."  This means that if you want something to go up, some force must push down.  If you want something to move to the right, some force must push to the left.

Let's look at a special rocket made from a match.  We build these in Space Tech Camp Rocketry class and it works because it obeys Newton's third law of motion.  Come build one in camp with us.