Local students show off their smarts at annual competition

The energy was electric Tuesday at the annual Flathead County Science Fair.

After organizers decided the science fair had outgrown its former location at West Valley School, this year’s fair was held in the Expo Building at the Flathead County Fairgrounds.

The science fair featured aisles of eye-catching display boards and experiment materials representing weeks of research and trial and error.

Tuesday’s judging was for sixth grade through high school. Third through fifth grades will present their projects from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. March 11 in the Expo Building.

 After judges assessed each project, students let off steam and socialized while awaiting results.

 Somers School eighth-grader Caley Halbran was concerned about her community’s water and conducting a project reflecting that.

She stood next to her project display and explained how potential ground contaminants such as such as naphthalene, xylene, gas and diesel affect the structural integrity of commonly used water pipe gaskets made out of styrene butadiene synthetic rubber.

The key part of her experiment involved the effect of naphthalene and xylene on the gaskets. Both chemicals are found in high concentrations in creosote, a product used in an old railroad tie plant in Somers. Railroad ties were coated in creosote for preservation from around 1929 to 1970 and dumped before there were strict laws.

“Somers has an old tie plant,” Halbran said pointing to a map on her display board. She traced a very short distance to a main water line that crosses it.

Halbran said this might be a site of possible water contamination if the water pipe gaskets are affected by creosote.

Halbran tested 72 gaskets over four weeks. The 48 gaskets she had in a sealed display showed some expansion, shrinkage and liquid seepage. Halbran also did a stretch test after the gaskets soaked in the chemical solutions to test breakage.

“Some of them broke if their molecular structure was degraded,” Halbran said.

Halbran said an alternative to the styrene butadiene rubber gaskets is a stronger synthetic rubber called Viton. She noted that Viton gaskets have to be specially requested.

“Somers’ drinking water is not contaminated, but it could find its way in,” Halbran said.

With so many cleaning products to choose from, West Valley School sixth-grader Kinzie Peterson wanted to find out if “bacteria busting” product claims were true in her science project.

Peterson tested five types of disinfectants — warm soapy water, bleach, Formula 409, Windex and Clorox Disinfecting Wipes.

“I wanted to see which type would be the best and killing bacteria,” Peterson said. “I put raw chicken on a plastic cutting board and used two squirts of the disinfectants — except the wipes — and wiped it up with a paper towel.”

She then swabbed the cutting board.

Peterson found out that the product she thought would perform the best had subpar results.

“I predicted the Clorox Wipes would disinfect the best because the company claims it kills 99.9 percent of bacteria. The Clorox Wipes did the worst. From my research what people don’t know is that wipes smear germs around,” Peterson said.

Peterson did three trials and said she would probably do more if she tried again because she was surprised at one of the top performers in one of the trials was Windex, which contains ammonia. Peterson said she wasn’t sure if that trial was a fluke.

Peterson won a grand champion medal in the sixth-grade biological science category.

Baseball player and West Valley sixth-grader Daniel Kernan also had a practical concern for his experiment. Kernan asked the question, “Does mass matter?” in baseball bats to hit a baseball faster.

“I play baseball a bunch. I was interested in the different bat weights people used and which ones were the best — if a bat with more mass would hit the baseball the fastest,” Kernan said. Kernan won a grand champion medal in the sixth-grade physical science category.

Next to him was a large wooden box with a PVC pipe attached to an aluminum bat connected to it. Kernan demonstrated how the swing was controlled by surgical tubing tied around the bat when he pulled the bat back and released it. The bat would then hit a stationary ball on a tee. Kernan would place different weights inside the bat to experiment. He used a radar gun to measure the speed of the ball.

“I found that the lightest bat [no weight added] had the fastest batted ball speed,” Kernan said.

Kernan said he learned a lot about the science of baseball and if he re-tried his experiment he would use a moving ball and test a wooden bat.

“I never thought baseball was as complicated as it is,” Kernan said noting on his display board such science concepts as mass, acceleration, momentum, force and impact.

During award announcements, master of ceremonies Tara Norick encouraged students to think about next year’s projects and to keep participating in the science fair whether it is required or not.

Reporter Hilary Matheson may be reached at 758-4431 or by email at hmatheson@dailyinterlake.com.