Trajectories

1.      Lab 5 – Trajectories

Lab conducted by Mohammed Karim (author), Curtis, and Lynel on September 21, 2016.

2.      Objective – The goal of this lab is to use projectile motion to find various unknowns throughout the lab.

3.      Theory/Introduction – After watching a couple of videos on projectile motion, we’re tasked with scenarios. In this lab, we are to find various unknowns, such as the distance an object would land at when going at an unknown velocity.

4.      Apparatus/Procedure

                                   

       As you can see in figure 1, we positioned the ramp at an angle of 53 degrees. The ball rolls off the ramp onto the surface for a small distance, where it falls 89.5 cm. After manipulating the equation:

Y=1/2gt^2

We put the equation in terms of velocity:

V=(g/2y)^1/2 * x

Plugging this in, we get 1.64 m/s. We then mess with more projectile motion equations to get the distance the object will fall at. (See figure 5.2 for the work). After calculating it, we found that the block would land about 60.1 cm. A test run showed that our calculations were correct. The ball went a distance of 59 cm. 5 test runs averaged out to be 56.5 cm with a fluctuation of +/- 2.5 cm. The test runs results were 56.5 +/- 2.5cm.

5.      

Figure 5.2

6.      Conclusion

Our test runs seemed to be very close to the calculated result. We believe that no mistakes were made in terms of balancing equations and conducting the experiment, as we had the professor check our equations and results. The margin of error may be from the following:

“Friction, Potential initial velocity, measurement uncertainty, placement uncertainty, air resistance, and angle uncertainty.”