What could be more fun than making your own rocket launcher? Well, as it’s Halloween, how about making a spooky flying bat rocket?

What do I need?

• Bottle
• Sellotape
• Straw
• Blu-Tac
• Scissors
• Scrap paper
• Black paper

STEP1 – The first thing is to assemble your rocket launcher and the very first step is to wrap a ball of Blu-Tack around your straw taking care that the straw stays ‘open’ so the air can get through.

STEP2 – Seal the Blu-Tack ball into the top of the bottle so that it’s just about airtight.

STEP3 – Now let’s make our rocket chassis. Cut a small piece of scrap paper about 5cm long and roll it into a tube that fits (not too tightly) around your straw.

STEP4 – Fold the top of your paper chassis over and tape it down.

STEP5 – Now, it’s time to add our bat! Cut out a bat shape from black paper (or just use regular paper and colour your bat in) and tape your bat to your paper chassis.

STEP6 – To launch your flying bat rocket simply ‘bash’ your bottle down and watch your bat go flying off into the air!

What’s going on?

Your flying bat rocket is awesome, right? But how does it work?

Your flying bat rocket is a great example of pressure. As you squash your bottle you increase the pressure and there is only one way out, through the tiny hole at the end of your straw. This makes the air come out quickly and pushes your flying bat rocket across the room.

More Fun Please! - Experiment like a real scientist!

• Which is the best size of bottle to make your flying bat travel furthest?
• Which type of straw works best? A party straw? A smoothie straw?
• How can you design the best rocket to fire the furthest? How far can you make it fly?
• If you want to see how the air flows you can fill up your bottle with water and try the experiment out. Do this somewhere you don’t mind making a mess!

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