Lab 1B: Magnitude, Measurement, & Motion

2/5/13
Section 1
Group Members: Helen Mei
Akbar Shakoor
Qi Wu
Hua Yi

Triple Starred Question Responses:

1.

How many blades of grass are contained in the average football field?
a. Approximately 23,040,000 blades per field. There are 57,600 square feet
in a football field (160ft by 360ft).
We estimated at 400 blades per square foot.
(400 x 57,600 equals 23,040,000)

2.

For something to function as a standard of measurement, it should not change its

size during measurement.
a. Name for standard length?
i. thumb
b. Sub-division will cut standard length into how many parts?
i. two equal parts
c. Name for sub-division for standard length?
i. nail

3.

For something to function as a standard of measurement, it should not change its

size during measurement.
a. Name for standard time unit?
i. snap
b. Sub-division will cut standard time into how many parts?
i. two equal parts
c. Name for sub-division for standard time unit?
i. cap

4.

What is the distance covered in one full one-way trip (use your own units)
a. Length for one-way trip is 9 thumbs
b. What is the greatest number of units by which you think your
measurement might be off in either direction?
i. +/- .2 thumbs

5.

Dynamic Measurements of Time

a. Time measurement for one-way trip?
i. 7 snaps
b. What is the greatest number of units by which you think your
measurement might be off in either direction?
i. +/- .1 snaps
c. Set up a four column table of values for time, time uncertainty,
average speed, and average speed uncertainty
i. see appendix 1 under appendices

6.

Write down your best inference for the uncertainty in each of your average speed
results.
a. Average speed uncertainty is very small for each trial because uncertainty for
time standard measurement and length standard measurement are both small

(+/- .1 snaps and +/- .2 thumbs respectively).

7.

What is the average speed of the glider as it travels down the track?
a. 1.233 thumbs/snap +/- .028 thumbs/snap

Methods and Findings

Our hypothesis is that the amount of time standard units (snaps)that it

will take for the car to to travel the full length of the track (9 thumbs) in
length standard units (thumbs) will fall somewhere between 5 and 10 snaps.
The first step in the procedure was to decide what the standard units were;
snaps measured time and thumbs measured length. Subdivisions for these
standard measurements were made; a cap measured half a snap and a
nail measured half a thumb. Then the air pump was attached to the track and
turned on; the glider was then put on top of the start of the active track and held
in place. When ready, the glider is let go and able to slide down the track; the
amount of time taken, in snaps, for the glider to go down the full track length
(9 thumbs) was measured. This was repeated another 4 times and the results
were recorded.
The absolute systematic uncertainty for each measurement is +/- .5 caps (for
time) and +/- .5 nails (for length) due to the reason that every measurement
has an absolute uncertainty of +/- .5 of the smallest measuring unit. Caps and
nails are the smallest measuring units for time and length respectively in this
experiment.
In conclusion, the average speed of the glider over the length of the track,
by our defined standard units for time and length is: 1.233 thumbs/snap
+/- .028 thumbs/snap. It is clear from the measured results (see appendix
1 in appendices) that it took an average of 7.3 snaps for the glider to go the
full distance of the track, which was measured at 9 thumbs. This conclusion
agrees with the hypothesis that it would take between 5 and 10 snaps for the
glider to travel the full length of the track.

Appendices
Appendix 1:
Time
7 snaps
8 snaps
7 snaps
7 snaps
7.5 snaps

Time Uncertainty
+/- 0.1 snap
+/- 0.1 snap
+/- 0.1 snap
+/- 0.1 snap
+/- 0.1 snap

Average Speed
1.285 thumbs/snap
1.124 thumbs/snap
1.285 thumbs/snap
1.285 thumbs/snap
1.204 thumbs/snap

Average Speed Uncertainty

+/- .030 thumbs/snap
+/- .025 thumbs/snap
+/- .030 thumbs/snap
+/- .030 thumbs/snap
+/- .027 thumbs/snap