The Dissection of a Paintball Explosion - Conclusions
Tim Reibold and Brandon Winterling - 5/02

Conclusions

The purpose of our project was to capture high-quality overlaid images of a paintball colliding with a hard surface and to analyze those pictures to find the velocity, momentum, kinetic energy, F_net, and impulse of the collision and to find the velocity of the paint exiting the paintball shell. We reached these goals and were very pleased with our results. We found that the approximate velocity of the paint exiting the paintball shell was 78.5 m/s. Most importantly, we learned the proper technique for using a rotating mirror to take overlaid image photographs. For a future project, it would be interesting to have a consistent paint ball gun and compare the impulse of exploding paint balls at different temperatures.

All photos on this site are copyrighted by Brandon Winterling and Timothy Reibold, 2002. 
To inquire about picture use please contact Loren Winters at winters@ncssm.edu