Motion Down an Inclined Plane
Andrew Park
Ms. Jatindranauth
SPH 3U7-A
September 28, 2017
Introduction The purpose of this lab is to determine the effect displacement has on the final velocity of a trolley on an inclined ramp.
What is hypothesized is that as the distance the trolley rolls down decreases, the velocity should decrease with it. Also, because the trolley should uniformly accelerate, the standard equations of motion can be used to calculate many different variables (one such being acceleration using displacement and velocity). This relationship can be confirmed using the SUVAT equation of v2 = u2 + 2as and can be simplified to v2 = 2as as the initial velocity will be a controlled variable set to zero at …show more content…
The final velocity will either increase, decrease or remain the same as the independent variable of distance is changed.
Control Variable:
The angle of the slope (ramp) remained the same throughout the experiment by never changing the height of the stand that the ramp is mounted on. This ensured that the velocity would not change according to the angle of the slope.
The surface of the slope was kept consistent by always using the same ramp for all of the trials. This would make sure that the path the trolley took when rolling down never changed. Also, the trolley was set on the two indents of the ramp so that it would always be rolling down the same path on the ramp straight down the middle of the ramp. This would keep times from increasing due to obstructions on the surface of the slope.
The initial velocity of the trolley was kept consistent throughout trials by letting the trolley roll down on its own rather than applying force to it by pushing it downwards. This kept the initial velocity from changing throughout trials and allowed the results to be as accurate as …show more content…
This is supported by the fact that velocity is linear in the graph which should mean that acceleration is uniform. Also, using the angle of the ramp (2.0 degrees), the acceleration can be calculated using the formula of a = gsin. From that formula, the calculated acceleration would be 0.342 m s-2 which is approximately 3.5 times larger than the measured acceleration and this is due to the fact that the calculated acceleration does not factor in air resistance or the friction between the trolley and the ramp which is why it is so much greater than the actual measured acceleration. The spread of data on the graph is quite linear with each data point out of the error bars of other data points. The intercept of the line is very low at 0.0009 m s-2. This is because the controlled variable of initial velocity of the trolley is meant to be zero and so when time is equal to zero, its velocity should also equal zero and so the lower the intercept of the line is, the better we controlled the initial velocity of the trolley. Some of the weaknesses of my methods were revealed through the data with large error bars and a very wide gradient that meant that the data was not as precise as it should have been. This could have occurred due to the usage of a less accurate measurement device with the LabQUEST rounding time to centiseconds which probably increased the unit for uncertainties in the data. With
Andrew Park
Ms. Jatindranauth
SPH 3U7-A
September 28, 2017
Introduction The purpose of this lab is to determine the effect displacement has on the final velocity of a trolley on an inclined ramp.
What is hypothesized is that as the distance the trolley rolls down decreases, the velocity should decrease with it. Also, because the trolley should uniformly accelerate, the standard equations of motion can be used to calculate many different variables (one such being acceleration using displacement and velocity). This relationship can be confirmed using the SUVAT equation of v2 = u2 + 2as and can be simplified to v2 = 2as as the initial velocity will be a controlled variable set to zero at …show more content…
The final velocity will either increase, decrease or remain the same as the independent variable of distance is changed.
Control Variable:
The angle of the slope (ramp) remained the same throughout the experiment by never changing the height of the stand that the ramp is mounted on. This ensured that the velocity would not change according to the angle of the slope.
The surface of the slope was kept consistent by always using the same ramp for all of the trials. This would make sure that the path the trolley took when rolling down never changed. Also, the trolley was set on the two indents of the ramp so that it would always be rolling down the same path on the ramp straight down the middle of the ramp. This would keep times from increasing due to obstructions on the surface of the slope.
The initial velocity of the trolley was kept consistent throughout trials by letting the trolley roll down on its own rather than applying force to it by pushing it downwards. This kept the initial velocity from changing throughout trials and allowed the results to be as accurate as …show more content…
This is supported by the fact that velocity is linear in the graph which should mean that acceleration is uniform. Also, using the angle of the ramp (2.0 degrees), the acceleration can be calculated using the formula of a = gsin. From that formula, the calculated acceleration would be 0.342 m s-2 which is approximately 3.5 times larger than the measured acceleration and this is due to the fact that the calculated acceleration does not factor in air resistance or the friction between the trolley and the ramp which is why it is so much greater than the actual measured acceleration. The spread of data on the graph is quite linear with each data point out of the error bars of other data points. The intercept of the line is very low at 0.0009 m s-2. This is because the controlled variable of initial velocity of the trolley is meant to be zero and so when time is equal to zero, its velocity should also equal zero and so the lower the intercept of the line is, the better we controlled the initial velocity of the trolley. Some of the weaknesses of my methods were revealed through the data with large error bars and a very wide gradient that meant that the data was not as precise as it should have been. This could have occurred due to the usage of a less accurate measurement device with the LabQUEST rounding time to centiseconds which probably increased the unit for uncertainties in the data. With