Discover: Get Your Motor Running

The motion from an electric motor can be used in many ways.



Using electric motors to produce motion can be fun!  Slot car racers are toy cars with electric motors in them, but they do not carry a source of electric energy.  The trick is that they travel on a track that is electrified.  The slot car motor makes contact with positive and negative sides of a metal track.  Electricity flows through the wires and into the motor, making the car move down the track.  Go as fast as you can, but try to stay on the track! 

If your toy car is big enough to carry a battery, it can move on its own.  Remote controlled cars have a very simple circuit:  a powerful electric motor with a big battery and an on/off switch.  (Of course, that switch with a resistor that allows the operator to control speed is controlled remotely by radio waves—a more complex concept!)  Turn it on, and you have a very fast little car!
Each electric motor has an axle in the middle that spins when the motor is running.  This spinning motion is perfect for making vehicles move.  It can also do other jobs that are not spinning (such as in an electric toothbrush), but you need to attach something to the axle if you want to change the spinning motion.

Video

With something as simple as a cable and hook, you can turn the spinning motion of an electric motor into motion that moves in a straight line. Watch Electric Cable Hoist to see how.

How can you build an electric motor-powered vehicle or device?


 Materials
  • Electricity Kit items: switch, motor, propeller, connecting wires, lamp holder and lamp, battery holder (or thick elastic band)
  • various common home materials such as tape, scissors, thin elastic band, paper, cardboard, string, or toy building kits  (Exact materials depend on the design of vehicle or device you decide to build.)
  • pencil and paper
  • batteries - AA cells or D cell
  • PhET simulation on Yenka software
  • Optional: digital camera or scanner
Website
Check out this website for classroom examples of electric cars designs.  
http://grasmereschool.ca/eteachers/20632/grade-5-science-electricity-and-magnetism

 

Notebook

Click here to download the instructions for this activity. Save to your Electricity Notebook.

  Skill Builder

Click a link below to learn how to:

use Yenka Electricity and Magnetism