Kingdom of Small Balls

1、 Display purpose:

Exhibition items provide ten interactive mechanisms for visitors to observe the movement of the ball during operation, stimulating their curiosity.

2、 The scientific and technological principles demonstrated:

Each group of devices utilizes small balls controlled by airflow to travel along different paths, creating a fascinating kingdom of small balls. In interactive activities, participants use operating mechanisms to select and drive small balls to be transmitted between various mechanisms. By observing the movement process of the ball, we can stimulate their interest in learning physics principles and exploring science.

3、 Description:

The exhibition items consist of ten interactive institutions, including Hedgehog Roll Hill, Sniper Track, Cannon Combination, Maze of Different Sizes, Balance Pendulum, Ferris Wheel, Probability Combination, Bicycle Blow, Cannon, and Bernoulli Suspension Ball.

Each group of devices utilizes small balls controlled by airflow to travel along different paths, creating a fascinating kingdom of small balls. In interactive activities, participants use operating mechanisms to select and drive small balls to be transmitted between various mechanisms. By observing the movement process of the ball, we can stimulate their interest in learning physics principles and exploring science.

4、 How to Operate:

Participants drive the movement of small balls in various sub exhibition items, observing the movement patterns and trajectories of the balls.

4、 Detailed description of exhibits:

The exhibition items mainly demonstrate scientific knowledge such as free fall, forces, probability, inertia, Bernoulli's principle, resistance, and various mechanical structures.

Bernoulli floating ball (obedient ball): Press the button and you will see that the ball, which was originally moving vertically upwards, obediently changes direction when it reaches the port on the U-shaped pipe and enters the horizontal pipe. This is mainly based on Bernoulli's principle, where the higher the fluid flow velocity, the lower the pressure, and the lower the flow velocity, the higher the pressure. The vertical airflow creates negative pressure inside the U-shaped tube. When the ball moves to the upper port of the U-shaped tube, it is obediently sucked into the horizontal pipeline under the action of negative pressure. Do you feel sucked in when standing next to a high-speed train?

Bicycle blowing (manual power generation): A small generator is connected inside the bicycle. When pedaling the bicycle, the generator generates electricity to activate the air pump, producing a strong airflow that causes the ball to move upwards.

Shooting cannon: Place the ball into a transparent tube, and the upper wheel is connected to a gear set consisting of two gears and a rack. When we rotate the upper wheel, the rack will drive another gear to adjust the aiming angle of the cannon.

Rotate the lower wheel, which drives a baffle. When the wheel is lowered, the baffle will quickly compress the air. When the baffle is opened again, the strong force emitted will make the ball launch further.

Pulley block structure: This is a pulley block composed of two pulleys. We can see that these two pulleys are fixed on the wall, which we call fixed pulleys. Fixed pulleys have the function of changing the direction of force. Here, we use the fixed pulley block to convert the force of pulling down the rope into the force of pulling up the wooden board, so that the ball can smoothly pass through the track and start the next journey.

Balance pendulum (lever): Here, we can pull the rope to tilt the wooden board to the other side, causing the ball to roll down. This wooden board is like a seesaw structure, with a support frame in the middle, which actually forms the lever structure we talked about in science class. The support frame is the fulcrum of the lever. According to the law of lever balance: the left force arm multiplied by the left force is equal to the right force arm multiplied by the right force. The closer the place where the rope is tied to the fulcrum, that is, the smaller the force arm, the greater the force needed, just like when we play with a seesaw, smart children and heavier partners will move away from the middle bracket to achieve balance with each other.

Probability combination: Here, we will see many small pillars ahead, evenly distributed on the wall. If a ball falls from above, it will randomly fall in the middle of the pillars, and we cannot predict which side of the pipeline it will fall into. This is a probability combination structure. Although we cannot predict which specific pipeline the ball will fall into each time, from a statistical perspective, the probability of the ball ultimately falling into different pipelines is the same.

Ferris wheel: This is a Ferris wheel transport structure, where small balls fall into the Ferris wheel slot and are transported to the next pipeline as the Ferris wheel rotates. Although this mechanical structure is simple, it reflects people's wisdom. Ancient Chinese waterwheels also used the Ferris wheel structure to transport water from low to high places.

Hedgehog rolling on the hillside: Here, we can see the ball rolling upwards along the chain, just like a hedgehog rolling upwards on the ground with its own spikes. Here we can see that the entire structure uses two gears and a chain, just like the transmission structure of our bicycle, which we call the chain tooth structure. The chain tooth structure combines the characteristics of gears and chains, allowing for remote transmission.

Maze structure: Here we can see the small ball passing through complex maze channels and eventually reaching the next pipeline.

Sniper track: This is like a sniper field, where small balls are launched from above, pass through these gear shaped obstacles in the middle, and finally hit the thin plate below.

In addition to the above, there are many interesting scientific principles in the Kingdom of Small Balls. If you love to study, you can continue to explore.