Children's Museum of Houston

Marshmallow Mayhem

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This week, my assistants and I took over the Inventors’ Workshop at the Children’s Museum of Houston to do a little engineering.  We designed and built Marshmallow Blasters using some 1/2 inch PVC pipe, some PVC connectors, and some PVC caps.

Our blasters use air pressure to fire off the marshmallows.  Remember that air is made of matter (Nitrogen, Oxygen, Argon, Carbon Dioxide, and other trace gases), so it can exert a force on other forms of matter.  Air pressure is the amount of force being exerted against a given area.  Since the area of our marshmallows is mostly the same, the more pressure we apply, the greater the force being exerted on the marshmallows.  The more force we apply, the further the marshmallows will fly!