Summer 2006 Geyser Experiments

Mom and I decided to check out the Diet Coke and Mentos geyser experiments that have been showing up on Internet sites such as YouTube. Getting a good geyser is actually a little harder than it looks. The photo to the right was our fifth try!

The key is getting a lot of mentos into the diet coke as fast as possible. We also learned that room temperature is better than being chilled for the Diet Coke, and that cans don't work well at all. We conducted experiments at 5,000 feet elevation (Denver) and at 9,000 feet in the Rocky Mountains but we didn't conclude if there are differences based on elevation.

Our first experiment was conducted at 9,000 feet with a smaller bottle of diet code (1 liter). My friend Shiloh assisted, along with mom, for #1 and #2.

We tried a can of Diet Coke for Experiment #2 but that wasn't very successful.

Experiment #3 and all the other experiments were conducted at 5,000 feet elevation.

Experiments #4 and #6 were a little different as you can see.

Experiment #5 was our greatest success with a great spray at least 15 feet high.

Experiment #7 was interesting but not great, and it was getting dark and hard to photograph..

The best of these "experiments" we have seen on the internet is here.