A group of students performed the same "Newton's Second Law" experiment that you did in class. For this lab, assume g = 9.81 m/s2. They obtained the following results:
| m1(kg) |
t1(s) |
v1(m/s) |
t2(s) |
v2(m/s) |
| 0.05 |
1.2 |
0.25 |
1.795 |
0.4222 |
| 0.1 |
1.23 |
0.324 |
1.6355 |
0.6924 |
| 0.15 |
1.15 |
0.382 |
1.4786 |
0.8553 |
| 0.2 |
1.11 |
0.424 |
1.396 |
0.9945 |
where m1 is the value of the hanging mass (including the mass of the hanger), v1 is the average velocity and t1 is the time at which v1 is the instantaneous velocity for the first photogate, and v2 is the average velocity and t2 is the time at which v2 is the instantaneous velocity for the second photogate.
(a) Use Excel to construct a spreadsheet to do the following. (You will not submit this spreadsheet. However, the results will be needed later in this problem.)
(i) Enter the above data.
(ii) Compute the acceleration, a, for each trial.
(iii) Create a graph of the hanging weight m1g vs. the acceleration.
(iv) Use the trendline option to draw the best fit line for the above data and determine the slope and y-intercept from it.
(v) report your results below.
slope = Units are required for this answer.
y-intercept = Units are required for this answer.
(b) Use the information you obtained from your graph to determine the total mass of the system M = m1 + m2.
(c) Using the information you obtained in parts (a) and (b), predict what the value of the acceleration would be if the value of the hanging mass were increased to m1 = 0.50 kg.