Interesting Tips on How to Build a Volcano
Building a volcano is a fast and easy method to see the principles of a real volcano up close and personal without actually risking the deadly gases and molten lava a real volcano causes. Thus if you are interested in building a volcano or you are required to build one as a science project or something, here is all you need to know to make one using things available around your home.
Required Tools
Brushes
Required Materials
6 cups of flour
2 cups of salt
4 tablespoons of cooking oil
2 cups of tap water
Warm water
Baking soda
Red food coloring
Dishwasher detergent
Vinegar
Baking dish/plywood
Plastic soda bottle (2 liter or smaller)
Paint
Plastic decorations (trees, shrubs, rocks, etc)
Instructions
Begin with the dough, which will make the mountain of the volcano. You can purchase play dough or some other sort of pre-made dough if you prefer but as these instructions are for items you most likely have easily available at home. You can make your own dough using the flour, salt, cooking oil and tap water. Your dough should be smooth and firm so that it is easy to mold.
Lay the baking dish/plywood on a level surface as the base of your volcano (a baking dish might be best since it will hold the lava when it overflows and minimize the quantity of lava you have to wipe up).
Position the soda bottle on the base you prefer and start molding the dough around it to make a mountain. If you do not have sufficient dough to pad the mountain and make it as big as you wish you can place cardboard, wads of newspaper or like items around the sides of the bottle to take up some of the space.
Take the cover off the bottle if you have not already done so and carry the dough all the way up to the top of the bottle so that the bottle is entirely hidden. You can make grooves in the side of the mountain for lava to flow down, or whatever else you wish to make the mountain more real.
Permit the dough-mountain to dry totally and then use brushes to paint the mountain or spray it with spray paint. You can subsequently set the plastic decorations around the mountain and on the sides to decorated it to your pleasing, then it is time to move on to the explosion of the volcano.
Fill the bottle to about ¾ with the warm water and add the red food coloring. Put in about 6 drops of the dishwashing detergent to make the foam part of the volcano, 2 tablespoons of baking soda, and then pour about a ¼ cup of the vinegar inside the bottle and stand back and see the explosion happen!
You may use and reuse the volcano as many times as you wish, all you need to do is use a rag to clean up the lava flow and it is ready to go again.
Tips and Warnings
Be wary not to drop dough inside the bottle as you construct the mountain because the dough may interfere with the mixture used to make the volcano explode.
The water in the bottle does not have to be hot however, the warmer it is, the better the explosion will be.
If you want orange-colored lava, add a few drops of yellow food coloring besides the red coloring in the bottle.
Add more than 2 tablespoons of baking soda if you want an even larger explosion but be ready for the additional clean up!
Do not try to cover the bottle once you add the vinegar because pressure may grow inside the bottle and cause it explode.
Learning build a volcano is an interesting and exciting science project to take up!