Create a Pool Noodle Sprinkler
In the Junkyard Tales: All Together Now story, “Let's Get To Work”, it's hot in the Junkyard, and the little pond in the back just won't cut it for keeping the Junkyard friends cool. But Ben, Spiro, and Sally have an idea—they can make rain! It takes a little ingenuity and a lot of hard work, but in the end, they give a cool gift to all of the Junkyard animals.
In the story, Ben, Spiro, and Sally, want to make a sprinkler, but they don't understand exactly how to do it. So they combine their past observations of the human Junkyard workers with some experimentation of their own to solve the problem, just like scientists and engineers do every day.
Our family did similar things in making this pool noodle sprinkler.
The first noodle we used was too big. The space inside didn't hold the hose snugly. What's more, we used a knife to make holes, which were then also too big. The hose would not stay inside the pool noodle, and when we did get it to stay (with some additional packing to make the interior space snug) the too large holes let water gush out in a flow rather than spraying out like a sprinkler.
For the next attempt, we chose a smaller pool noodle, and used a barbecue skewer to make just a few holes. This time the holes were just right to make a spray, but the increased water pressure made the hose burst out of the end of the noodle after just a few seconds of fun.
So then we taped the hose itself to the noodle. It worked well for about 10 seconds, but then a huge geyser burst through the side of the noodle. Too much water pressure again!
We turned off the water, used extra duct tape to patch the geyser, then poked several more holes with the skewer to decrease the overall pressure.
The result? Success! We had a sprinkler!
While this was a great lesson in problem solving, one of the benefits of the work that scientists and engineers do is that each one of us doesn't have to solve the same problem over and over again. If you want to experiment with a few different noodle sizes and hole making methods, go right ahead. If you just want to skip to the successful sprinkler fun, the method finally worked for us is below.
Either way, a pool noodle sprinkler is a cool treat for all!
Pool Noodle Sprinkler
Materials
- skinny pool noodle - knife (a bread knife will work best, if you have one) - duct tape - wooden skewer - garden hose
Directions
First, you need to cap off one end of the noodle. To do so, use the bread knife to cut off 4-5 inches of the noodle, then cut the piece you cut off into four equal pieces.
Take one of the four pieces and stuff it back inside one end of the noodle. Use duct tape to secure it well.
Then it's time to poke holes. How many holes you end up needing will depend on your house's water pressure, but between 20 and 30 is a good ball park. Use the skewer to make the holes along one side of the noodle, making sure the skewer only goes through wall.
Now it's time to see if your sprinkler works. As I said above, we had to duct tape our noodle to our garden hose to get it to all stay together.
Once the tape is secure, turn on the water slowly, don your swimsuits, and enjoy the fun.
If you liked this tutorial, here are others you might enjoy:
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