Light up a lightbulb using a balloon, find out how...
Nice project to do together
Details
You Need:
hard rubber comb or balloon
a dark room
fluorescent light bulb (not an incandescent bulb)
SAFETY NOTE: DO NOT USE ELECTRICITY FROM A WALL OUTLET FOR THIS EXPERIMENT. Handle the glass light bulb with care to avoid breakage. The bulb can be wrapped in sticky, transparent tape to reduce the chance of injury if it does break.
What to do:
Take the light bulb and comb into the dark room.
Charge the comb on your hair or sweater. Make sure to build up a lot of charge for this experiment.
Touch the charged part of the comb to the light bulb and watch very carefully.
You should be able to see small sparks. Experiment with touching different parts
of the bulb.
What happened: When the charged comb touched the bulb, electrons moved from it to the bulb, causing the small sparks of light inside. In normal operation, the electrons to light the bulb come from the electrical power lines through a wire in the end of the tube. (Fluorescent and incandescent light bulbs will be discussed in a future issue.)
Nice project to do together
