Aluminum bats VS Wooden bats!

Purpose My purpose of this experiment is to see if aluminum baseball bats will hit further then wooden bats. I wanted to do this experiment because it sounded fun and it looked easy to do.

Hypothesis My hypothesis is that the aluminum bat will hit much further then the wooden bat. The reason I think this is because if wooden bats hit further pros would use aluminum so people wont get hurt so much.

Interesting facts #1On February 2, 1876, the National League of Professional Baseball Clubs is formed. Baseball is mostly played in America. The New York Yankees have won 26 world Series titles, that is the most amount of times won. Baltimore Orioles shortstop Cal Ripken, Jr. didn't miss a game in 16 years In the 1850s there were baseball bats all shapes and sizes. They soon found out that bats with rounded barrels seemed to work the best. A rule was made in 1859 that bats could be no larger than 2.5 inches in diameter.

Materials 1 Aluminum baseball bat 1 Wooden baseball bat Preferably 10-20 baseballs (Less is fine but more running to get the balls.) Baseball tee. Any color Marker Measuring tape

Experiment Gather all materials. Put A for aluminum on half of the balls. Then put W for wooden on the other half. You do this so you can see what bat hit them. Find a good place to hit some baseballs. For example a baseball field, park, or any other open fields. Then set up the tee and get ready to hit. Hit fifteen balls from each of the two bats. Record the distance each ball went in a chart. Find the average of the distances of each set of balls from aluminum to wooden. Compare the two averages to find the bat that will hit the ball farther. The results may vary from the batter and the bat he is using. You can also try different grass types like turf, thin, and thick grass. Then you will conclude with the experiment.

Control/variables There is no control. Independent variable: is the distance of how far the balls go. Dependent variable: is what bat you use.

Observations How far you hit depends on the bat you use. The thinner the grass that you hit on the farther it goes.

Data Aluminum Wooden Trial 1 168ft 117ft Trial 2 198ft 132ft Trial 3 Average 173ft 132.6ft  

Analysis of data The experiment did test my hypothesis because I found out which hit further. I knew that it tested my hypothesis because it answered it and my purpose.  

Conclusion: My hypothesis was correct that the aluminum bat will hit much farther. I would not change the experiment because it was fun and very interesting. One question that I would have is why do they hit farther?

References http://www.factmonster.com/ipka/A0771577.html http://www.sciencebuddies.org/ http://www.google.com/ http://www.baseball-bats.net/baseball-bats/baseball-bat-history/index.html http://www.buzzle.com/articles/facts-about-baseball.html