Uploaded May 2013 | Updated September 2026, 3 weeks ago
Charles law demo | Ping Pong ball experiment | Science Experiments video
What would you do to a ping pong ball which is out of shape or crushed?
Trash it??
No, don't!
Here's a cool science trick to bring it back in to shape.
For this experiment, you'll need:
Stove, or a burner
Bowl of water
Crushed Ping pong ball
Procedure
Boil the water for about 3-5 minutes.
Place the crushed ping pong ball in the boiling water.
After some time, notice that ping pong magically comes back to shape.
Don't forget to play with it... YAY!!
Explanation:
Ping pong balls are made up of plastic material called celluloid. Celluloid's are compounds which are made from nitrocellulose and camphor.
The camphor is a special substance called sublimatory substance. These sublimatory substances convert directly into gas when heated up.
The Camphor present in the ping pong ball also gets heated up and converts itself into gas and this gas expands on heating. This is because volume increases with temperature. This is known as the Charles law.
Charles law states that "the volume of a given mass of gas is directly proportional to the temperature."
Charles law can mathematically represented with the equation
V ∝ T
Where V is the Volume of the body and
T is the Temparature.
The increase in temperature will increase the volume of the gas which in turn increases the volume of the ball to the maximum extent possible. This increase in volume of gas pushes the crushed part out getting the ball back into shape.
Since you know the trick now, look out for the crushed Ping-Pong balls and turn them into brand new balls.
Thanks for watching and don't forget to subscribe.
Charles law demo | Ping Pong ball experiment | Science Experiments video
What would you do to a ping pong ball which is out of shape or crushed?
Trash it??
No, don't!
Here's a cool science trick to bring it back in to shape.
For this experiment, you'll need:
Stove, or a burner
Bowl of water
Crushed Ping pong ball
Procedure
Boil the water for about 3-5 minutes.
Place the crushed ping pong ball in the boiling water.
After some time, notice that ping pong magically comes back to shape.
Don't forget to play with it... YAY!!
Explanation:
Ping pong balls are made up of plastic material called celluloid. Celluloid's are compounds which are made from nitrocellulose and camphor.
The camphor is a special substance called sublimatory substance. These sublimatory substances convert directly into gas when heated up.
The Camphor present in the ping pong ball also gets heated up and converts itself into gas and this gas expands on heating. This is because volume increases with temperature. This is known as the Charles law.
Charles law states that "the volume of a given mass of gas is directly proportional to the temperature."
Charles law can mathematically represented with the equation
V ∝ T
Where V is the Volume of the body and
T is the Temparature.
The increase in temperature will increase the volume of the gas which in turn increases the volume of the ball to the maximum extent possible. This increase in volume of gas pushes the crushed part out getting the ball back into shape.
Since you know the trick now, look out for the crushed Ping-Pong balls and turn them into brand new balls.
Thanks for watching and don't forget to subscribe.
