As you blow air into the bottle, the air pressure increases inside the bottle. This higher pressure pushes on the water, which gets forced up and out the straw (and up your nose!).


Materials: small lump of clay, water, a straw, and one empty 2-liter soda bottle.


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Comments

13 Responses to “Fountain Bottle”

  1. elizabethbruins says:

    this was so much fun and soooo cool

  2. Anita Foster says:

    Ok
    Thanks

  3. That’s a great question – and it’s hard to figure out what’s going on without standing right in front of you while you do your experiment, so here is my best shot at it:

    1. When you remove the top, can you blow easily through the straw?
    2. When you put the top back on and screw it down tightly, and blow air in the straw, make sure you’ve got a LOT of air pressure that you’re aiming down the straw. Give it to a parent that can easily inflate balloons for example.

  4. Anita Foster says:

    When we tried this experiment it did not work so we tried more clay and it still did not work
    We herd air the first time, but when we added more clay it we did not hear any more but still did not work . Do you know why?

    Thank you

  5. Somewhat… there’s usually a pump that pushes water through instead of a set of air-powered lungs.

  6. Anonymous says:

    Is this how fountain’s work?

  7. Amber Nancarrow says:

    We did this experiment today. I actually used a large sized lemon juice bottle–Costco sells lemon juice in large bottles. I broke off the flip up lid and the straw fit perfectly in the hole that is used to squeeze out the lemon juice. Then we used clay and sealed the opening as described in the video, and it worked everytime!

  8. Jennifer Bechtel says:

    I’m so glad I found this experiment online because on the mastery DVD the video stops right as you lean over the tube to blow!! On the DVD we don’t get to see the water shoot up out of the bottle.

    My son was disappointed he didn’t get to see water go up your nose. 🙂

  9. Linda Miller says:

    We tried this experiment by using various levels of water and seeing what happened when we pushed the straw farther down. If you can see this photo, you can see how far the fountain sprang up. What fun!

  10. You’re right – good eye! It’s part of the hour-long Aeronautics DVD included in my Science Mastery program. This is one of the 30+ experiments on the DVD, most of which are included in the Flight Lab during the e-Camp program in the summer.

  11. Sophia Pitcher says:

    Hi Aurora,

    This looks like part of a longer video, which one is it?

    Thanks,
    Jasmin

  12. Lydia Fancher says:

    I got an idea!!! use the stuff you use for pop rocket and it makes a gas and the water flys into the air and goes high… maybe…

  13. Lydia Fancher says:

    lol that looks fun!