Hooke’s Law Experiment
You will complete the following experiment in class on May 6th, in groups of two. You
will then submit a lab report as a group, due on Monday, May 16th. The following
elements are required in your lab report (in this order):
 Abstract- see below
 Purpose
 Materials
 Results
 Analysis- I am not providing any discussion questions, so you will simply
explain your results. You will definitely need to include references.
 Conclusion
 References
Most of you have probably not done an abstract before, so we will go over this in class on
Wednesday. An abstract is a summary of the lab report, included so that someone can
learn what you’ve achieved without reading the entire report. It is structured as follows:
1. State the purpose of your experiment. Why did you do this study or project?
2. Write one to two sentences summarizing your procedure. What did you do, and how?
3. Summarize your results (1-2 sentences). What did you find?
4. Summarize your conclusions (1-2 sentences). What do you findings mean?
Total should be between 100 and 250 words.
Procedure:
1. Measure the spring’s length. Take the measurement from the rod from which the
spring is suspended to the last spiral. This makes it possible to take more precise
measurements, since the same reference point is always used.
2. Hang a mass to the spring’s free extremity. Record the mass and force in table 1.
3. Measure the spring’s length, calculate and record the spring’s elongation (first
wait for it to stabilize).
4. Repeat steps 2 and 3 five times, each for different masses.
5. Graph the data to find the spring constant.
Suspended mass in
grams (g)
Table 1. Insert your title here.
Force applied (F) to Spring’s length in
the spring in
metres (m)
newtons (N)
Spring’s elongation
(Δx) in metres (m)