If you have ever seen the submarine movie "The Hunt for Red October
" you will remember that it’s big thing was the silent propulsion system. It used something called ‘magnetohydrodynamics‘, that is it used a powerful electro magnet to pull water through a pipe and squirt it out the back. Your thinking ‘water and magnets? Get real’ well it’s true, water, and may other fluid type things (solar wind, salt water…) can be manipulated with magnetic fields. Water is a substance that is diamagnetic, that means that it is magnetic in the presence of a magnetic field (read the Wikipedia article on it, it’s explained better there). Grab a super magnet and shallow plastic pan and fill it with a little water and see what it does.
Anyway, this is a little project where you can experiment with this fascinating subject. Go have a look and try it for yourself. You could be having races with your mad scientist friends in no time..
Three magnetohydrodynamic propulsion projects