The 2010 SACS-AAPT Photo Competetion Award

The winner was Kyle Coffey from Kennesaw State University. His entry can be seen at Here. He won a $100 check and a certificate.

The 2010 SACS-AAPT Physics Award for the best HS Student/Teacher Project at the South Carolina Junior Academy of Science (SCJAS)

The winners were Jaron L. Pettis from Spring Valley High School, Columbia, SC and his teacher Michelle Sprigner. They each received a $100 check and a certificate. Jaron's Title and abstract are:

THE EFFECT OF PELLET WEIGHT AND BARREL LENGTH ON ACCURACY OF AN AIRSOFT GUN
Jaron L. Pettis
Spring Valley High School

Airsoft guns are toy guns that are made to look like real guns. Airsoft teams use these guns to shoot the other team. The guns shoot plastic pellets which are made to let you know you have been hit but not to cause severe damage. A huge conflict is how to increase accuracy of these guns. Two ways that are thought to increase accuracy are barrel length and pellet weight. If a longer barrel is used and heavier pellets are used then the accuracy is believed to increase. To test if barrel length and pellet weight effect accuracy a gun mount was made and used to aim an airsoft gun at a grid paper target. The pellet weights used were .3 grams, .2 grams, and .12 grams. The barrel lengths used were long (29.21cm) and short (19.05cm). The first trial was with the long barrel and the .3 gram pellets. The airsoft gun was loaded with 20 pellets and fired at the target until all pellets were fired. The locations where the pellets hit the target were marked and measured to find the mean and standard deviation. This was then used to find the accuracy and the closer it was to zero the more accurate the trail was. The same thing was repeated until all pellet weights were used and barrel lengths. The result was that the .3 gram pellets and the long barrel was the most accurate with the .12 gram pellets and short barrel being the least accurate supporting my hypothesis.

Dr. Mikhail Agrest (College of Charleston, Physics and Astronomy Department), center, presented the Award at the 2010 SCJAS Meeting , April 17, 2010