Problem/ Question
One question that I had been pondering for a month or so before the science fair was “What kind of soap works the best on its intended item?” Then, the science fair came along and I decided to test it out. It may be a weird thought that a 12 year old girl had these thoughts, but I have many questions at my young age. Which kind of soap works best?
Hypothesis
You know how it’s fun to play with the bubbles soap leaves behind? Well, whenever I do the dishes, there is always lots of bubbles after. I catch myself thinking, “Well, seems it did it’s job then.” and walk away. Bubbles must be the aftereffect of a job well done for soap! That’s the main reason I thought dish soap would work the best out of all four kinds of soap, hand soap, bar soap, dish soap, and cleaning wipes.
Procedures
Step 1: Collect needed Materials (Materials used in this experiment: Bar soap, hand soap, cleaning wipes, dish soap, lipstick, ranch, ketchup, jam, toothpaste, white clean towel)
Step 2: Apply some of the stain to the towel, use one soap on it to clean it, repeat. Tip: make rows of stain as to insure spoilable items used don’t perish while sitting out.
Step 3: Rate Soaps on effectiveness. Have multiple peers rate as well to insure fair test. Record all findings.
Step 4: Repeat testing to make sure that the first test was not just a fluke. If second test turns out about how the first test did, then move onto the next step. If not, test once more, and so on.
Step 5: Clean up time. Make sure all tested items don’t have fuzz or hair stuck to them, and make sure any spreading knives are properly cleaned. Wash towel to get the stains out.
Conclusion
In the end, I learned that cleaning wipes rock, and bar soap is terrible. I would never would have guessed that the typical bathroom soap would prove to be the least effective out of all of the four types of soap I chose, but an experiment is best when you learn something new. I guessed wrong in the beginning, I just figured that since dish soap created the most bubbles that it could clean the best. I do think that I could improve this experiment for the future, though. I could have used something better than an old white towel, What if I even used hand sanitiser? Well, I did have fun and that’s the main point, isn’t it?
Which Soap Works Best?
One question that I had been pondering for a month or so before the science fair was “What kind of soap works the best?” Then, the science fair came along and I decided to test it out. It may be a weird thought that a 12 year old girl had these thoughts, but I have many questions at my young age. Which kind of soap works best? First I tried to clean different kinds of soap with common, and sometimes uncommon, household stains. Out of the four soaps I chose, I thought that dish soap would do the best because it has so many bubbles, so it must! So overall, I decided to base my experiment on the effectiveness of soap on miscellaneous items.
I started to gather ideas for what common stains appear normally. I eventually came up with lipstick, toothpaste, ranch, ketchup, and jam. The different kinds of soap I used included: bar soap, foamy hand soap, dish soap, and cleaning wipes. I tested each kind of soap with each kinds of stain on an old towel to see which worked best with each, then rated them on a scale of 1-10 on how effective they where.
Additionally, the first kind of soap I tested was bar soap. The first stain I tested was lipstick, and I rated it a 1 out of ten. Then toothpaste, which got another one. The bar soap did absolutely nothing to the ranch except for smearing it around, so it got a zero. With ketchup, bar soap works surprisingly well, earning a four. The next soap I tried out was the foamy hand soap. Lipstick got a 4, toothpaste was awarded a 6, ranch got the same as toothpaste, ketchup got a five, and finally, jam got a nine. Soap number three came in second place for effectiveness, with lipstick at a 6, toothpaste at a 7, ketchup at a nine, and jam a nine, too. The last and fourth soap I tested was cleaning wipes. This one did the best, lipstick: 3, toothpaste: 9, ranch: 8, ketchup: 10, and jam: 8. Moreover, Cleaning wipes did the best out of the four soap types.
In the end, I learned that cleaning wipes rock, and bar soap is terrible. I would never would have guessed that the typical bathroom soap would prove to be the least effective out of all of the four types of soap I chose, but an experiment is best when you learn something new. I guessed wrong in the beginning, I just figured that since dish soap created the most bubbles or something that it could clean the best. I do think that I could improve this experiment for the future, though. The main thing is to use something other than a random towel to use. Maybe I could have used an old shirt, which is anyway far more likely to have been stained than an old towel. What if I even used hand sanitiser? Well, I did have fun and that’s the main point, isn’t it?