how do ships float?
In: Physics
Displacement. If the item in the water weighs less than the water it pushes out of the way, it’ll float. If it weighs more than the water it pushes out of the way, it’ll sink.
Imaging a log that takes up 20 cubic feet of space.
Water weighs 62 lbs per cubic foot (if you fill up a box of water 1 foot by 1 foot by 1 foot.)
So that log will float on the water if it weighs less than 20×62 or 1240lbs. If the log weighs around the same weight or a bit more, one way to make it float is to carve out the middle. It’ll still take up about 20 cubic feet of space but it weighs just a fraction of what it did before. You can then use that freed up space to put other things in it like a dog or a person or a some supplies. Voila, you just created a dugout canoe, a basic boat.
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