Like this:

As a curious fellow, I decided to see if I could crush a can between my hands.  Well you already know from seeing the twigs that I call arms that this feat was not possible for me.  So I decided to figure out just how much force was needed to crush the can.

I’m using all my strength!

My twigs don’t work.

5 lbs.

10 lbs

40 lbs

60 lbs

CRUSHED!

50 lbs

90 lbs

95 lbs

After looking online, I could not find how strong an aluminum can was so, I decided to conduct my own experiment.  First I got a can of Green Tea and I got some weights to put on it.  I first applied 5 lbs up until 20 lbs then added up 10 lbs up until 40 lbs.  The can still was not crushed under 40 lbs of weight so then I tried it at 60 lbs.  It still would not crush!  After applying 95 lbs did it finally collapse.

Of course a good scientist always repeats the experiment to make sure that the experiment results are accurate.  I repeated the experiment again (using different weights so I don’t have to put a lot of them on) and the can was crushed again in 95 lbs or so (result was a little off but this is due to the uniqueness of each can and the time that the can was spent under the weight).

So that means that the force upon the can was 422.28 Newtons (95 lbs = 43.09 kg, W = mg = 43.09 x 9.8).  That’s quite a bit of force.

So with that, my credited Physics blog for the year is over.  Thanks for tuning in and I might write something here and there but not quite sure at the moment.  Physics was a great year and everyone good luck tomorrow on the AP exam!

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