I am looking for info about water rockets and how high a seald bottle will go before it pops its cork

Question

I simply wanted to get an answer to a question about altitude and water rocket second stages. OR how much altitide would be needed to casue a corked bottle to pop its cork with enough force to launch it a few feet at least

Answer 1

There are too many variables to answer the cork question.  It depends how tightly the cork is pressed into the bottle, how smooth the cork is, how smooth the bottle is, how long the cork is, the volume of the bottle, how much liquid is in the bottle, if there is alcohol in the bottle, the temperature of the bottle, etc.  If I had to guess, I would say that a wine bottle purchased in the store will not pop its cork no matter how high you go in the atmosphere.  The difference between the inside of the bottle and a perfect vacuum is only 15 PSI.  The cork is about half a square inch, so a perfect vacuum would only put 7.5 pounds of pressure on the cork.  If you have opened a wine bottle, it sure seems to take more than 7.5 pounds of pressure to get that cork out.  And that's in a perfect vacuum.  Plus, a cork popping out will not make a bottle travel to travel a few feet.  The cork is too light.