Today we used what we learned yesterday about construction and friction in our projects. "Spin the Ghost" was a learning experience where the students learned the use of gears, pulleys, crown gears, and gear boxes.  After doing some activities to learn more about gears and pulleys, we put everything together with a motorized vehicle. The "Solar Cars" challenge allowed the students to explore our main renewable energy source, the sun.  We used solar panels to power the cars. (Yes, even with partly cloudy skies, solar energy powered our vehicles!)  The vehicles the campers built used the solar panels to power the electric motors.  Solar panels generate only a small amount of power for our motors and they require no programming.  Knowing this, campers used gear and pulley arrangements to make their vehicles go fast!  Tomorrow, we will begin using the RCX to power our single motor vehicles, just what campers have been waiting for!

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