SHM Practice Problems

Today was a half day, so you worked on practice problems while I checked your labs from earlier in the week. These are due next class:

Ch. 13 Conceptual (p.465) #1, 2 + Problems (p. 467) #19, 21, 24, 25, 28

Bring your lab notebook next class! We're doing ANOTHER LAB!

Circles and SHM

Today we used circles to model simple harmonic motion, which gave us some equations for the position, velocity, and acceleration of an object undergoing SHM. We also talked about angular frequency.

Notes ended up on the board (below) and we used these sites to look at the motion:

UNSW School of Physics PhysClips: SHM Background Material

Teresa Martin Physics Flash Animations

If we had time we also watched this (just because it's cool).

Homework is Chapter 13 (p. 467) #12, 18, 22

Springs and Simple Harmonic Motion

Today we used the results from your lab to get an equation for the period of a mass on a spring. We also took a little bit of notes beyond that:

Notes: Simple Harmonic Motion

Homework is a little half-sheet worksheet I made: 2/8 HW (ignore the wrong date on this PDF scan). There is a ranking task on the back side that I cannot reproduce online, so you'll have to get a hard copy in class.

Lab: Period of a Mass on a Spring

Today you completed a lab to determine what and how quantities affect the period of oscillation for a mass on a spring.

Lab: Finding T for a Mass on a Spring

No extra homework tonight, but this lab is due Wednesday.

We ended up with some hints on the board, so there is a picture of it below.

If you missed the lab or didn't get enough data at home, there is an online simulation here:

PhET Mass-Spring Lab

To use it you need to make sure the "friction" is set to zero, time is set to "real time" and the planet is "earth." Use the spring on the far right and change its k value by moving the "softness spring 3" slider. You will have to find the k for each "softness" level by hanging a known weight on the spring and measuring how far it stretches. Then k = mg/x. Finally, you'll need more masses that the labelled ones provided, so I found the masses of the unlabeled colored masses for you: green = 70g, gold = 160g, red = 300g.

Springs!

Today we used your labs to figure out Hooke's Law. We also talked about ways the model of springs can be used to explain concepts that don't necessarily look like springs.

Dolphin Tails
Chemical Bonds
Robert Hooke

Homework: Chapter 13 (p.466) #1, 4, 5

Also bring your lab notebook Monday/Tuesday.

Spring Intro Lab

Today we derived Hooke's Law with a little intro lab:

Spring Intro Lab

The lab is due tomorrow.

Senior Debates

The Senior Debates were today, so I only had periods 5 and 6 in class. They had work time. You may have picked up your take-home test anytime at lunch or later, but if you didn't make sure to pick one up tomorrow.