11-Sept-2014 Trajectories Lab #5

The purpose of this lab is for us to understand projectile motion and to learn how to predict the point of impact of a ball on a inclined plane.

Materials:

• 2 aluminum v channels
• a steel ball
• board
• ring stand
• clamp
• paper and carbon paper
• tape

 This is the general set up of the apparatus. The two v channels were taped together in order to create and angle for the ball drop. The ring stand, pole and clamp were placed to hold the v channels up.

 

As for the paper and carbon paper that was placed on the floor by testing the ball drop to see were it will land. Then we put the papers around that area. With this setup we have to determine the initial velocity of the entire system drop.

After this is set up we measured all of the distances with a meter stick and placed them on this diagram.

Height of launch being 93cm, distance of launch being 47.2 cm away from bottom of table.

With the measurements we were able to do our calculation to find the initial velocity, which turned out to be 1.08 m/s.

 Then once that is figured out we had to figure out a formula that will help us determine the distance that the ball would strike a board if it was inclined against the table.

This formula will help us determine the theoretical distance while the actual measured distance after the laugh is 38 cm (.38 m).

With the theta measured at 45 degrees we were able to determine the theoretical distance at .33m meaning .05 meters from the actual.

Conclusion:
Our percent error=(experimental-theoretical)/theoretical*100%=15%.
Some uncertainties maybe the drops of the ball not being exact every time. We had to estimate the distance measured of x which may mess with some calculations.