Lab Manual 2005

EnergySituation: You’ve no doubt often heard people say, “I’d like to do some work but I don’thave the energy.” From this context we understand what they are trying to say but youmay find it difficult to define what is meant by the term “work” or “energy”. These termshave a meaning in a scientific sense as well although they are more abstract.You will learn in class that work is associated with a force acting on an object tomove it some distance and that energy, which is thought of as the ability to do work, canbe related to mass and velocity. In the following lab we will verify the relationshipbetween work and energy while examining the Work-Energy Theorem and Conservationof Energy.Materials:Motion detector, force sensor, dynamic cart and track, string, mass set, MPLI andGraphical Analysis.Part 1: Work - Energy TheoremProcedure:→ Enter MPLI and open the file AEnergy.exp@. A Force vs. time, position vs. time, andvelocity vs. time graph should appear. All necessary calibrations have beencompleted.→Record the mass of the cart (include the mass of the force sensor).m =→ Set up the apparatus as shown in figure 1.MotionsensorCart andForce sensorFigure 1X o X 1X 250gmassEnsure that the cart is placed 40 cm from the motion sensor (at start line) and a 50g massis placed on the end of the string.- 51 -