Solar Hydrogen System
Hydrogen Fuel Cells act as a power source for many things like our car. A hydrogen fuel cell is powered by distilled water that you put in the bottom and then, as we did in our project, you hook it up to a solar panel that is being charged with a light to give it an electric charge. The distilled water will start to rise from the bottom to the top as it was charged. The fuel cell then acted as a battery which we hooked into our breadboard and used it to make the motor of our car run.
Solar Panels are used as a way to collect solar energy. You can put the solar panel outside on a bright, sunny day or put it in front of a powerful light to charge it. The solar panel works better when you have a stronger light on it. The energy can then be transferred to other things such as powering lights or, as we did in this project, powering a hydrogen fuel cell to make a car move, using its individual power to power the motor, or combining the power of both the solar panel and the hydrogen fuel cell.
Series circuits are circuits whose components are end-to-end and the current has only one path to flow. In a series circuit each component relies on the others in front of it, so if one is taken out, the rest behind it will not work because the current cannot get to the rest. Parallel circuits are circuits whose components are all parallel with each other and the current has multiple paths to flow through. In a parallel circuit all the components are independent, so if one is taken out, the rest will still work because the current can still flow through the other paths.
Resolution
In the end, I learned a lot and I greatly enjoyed this project. Even though I had to work on my own for a day when Andrew was out, I still had a great time working with him. He helped a lot when he came back so we could then work on more things and we were able to figure out many things rather quickly and we ended up being very successful. I had a fun time trying to build a car that could hold everything even if the way it had turned out looked a bit different. I am very proud that we were one of the few who could get their car to move when racing outside and that we successfully crossed the finish line. This project really helped me to better learn how to do the wiring on a breadboard and how things work together to power things.
In the end, I learned a lot and I greatly enjoyed this project. Even though I had to work on my own for a day when Andrew was out, I still had a great time working with him. He helped a lot when he came back so we could then work on more things and we were able to figure out many things rather quickly and we ended up being very successful. I had a fun time trying to build a car that could hold everything even if the way it had turned out looked a bit different. I am very proud that we were one of the few who could get their car to move when racing outside and that we successfully crossed the finish line. This project really helped me to better learn how to do the wiring on a breadboard and how things work together to power things.