Egg Drop reasoning help.Why my egg survived?

Question

I have to do an egg drop for Physics which I made and tested my design off a 3 story building. I made a cone and lid out off poster board and stuffed the inside with a bag of cotton balls and the egg in the middle(which survived). Now I have to explain why my egg survived and i don't know why because the only things I can think of is air resistance, elastic potential energy, and velocity, which none of the design uses. Can anyone tell me why it survived using physics?

Answer 1

Its because of impulse and momentum. The cotton balls increases the impact time of the egg on the ground. This can be explained by the formula.


F= impulse
F = mometum / impact time
F = ( mass * velocity ) / impact time

As the impact time increases, Force decreases. The cottons cause to increase the impact time thus not breaking the egg.

This is a similar example of a car hitting a rigid brick wall and car hitting a big cotton ball. The car feels more force when hitting the rigid brick wall because of smaller impact time but when the car hits the cotton ball, the cotton increases impact time thus lowering the force acted upon the car.

Answer 2

The cover that you made for it absorbed enough shock to prevent the egg from cracking. Think of it like the cotton balls absorbing water, but instead they're absorbing energy.

When we did this in highschool, I put my egg in a gallon of jell-o.

It worked.

Answer 3

I agree with your first answerer.....i did this in school with a lot of paper towells, a toliet paper roll and duct tape, my egg also survived....the "padding" absorbed energy and impact

Answer 4

God Bless you for the wonderful work you're doing saving my kind. Maybe if there were more people like you in the world my little Billy would still be alive today *sniff* *wipes away tear*