Question

A group of students performed the same "Newton's Second Law". They obtained the following results:

m1(kg)	t1(s)	v1(m/s)	t2(s)	v2(m/s)
0.050	1.2000	0.2500	1.7733	0.4378
0.100	1.2300	0.3240	1.6288	0.6690
0.150	1.1500	0.3820	1.4751	0.8485
0.200	1.1100	0.4240	1.3937	0.9558

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	=
y-intercept	=

(b) Use the information you obtained from your graph to determine the total mass of the system M = m₁ + m₂.
M =  

(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 = 0.35 kg.
a =

Answer 1