*Centripetal Force Lab (Discovery)
PSI Physics – Centripetal Motion
Name______________________
Date__________ Period_______
All answers and data must follow the PSI Lab Report Format.
Objective
Verify graphically that the centripetal force F is proportional to v2 and determine the mass of the
stopper.
Materials (per team)
● Plastic Tube 10 cm to 20 cm long
● 1 cm outside diameter (polished at both ends)
● Nylon Cord about 1.0 m long
● Scale
● Stopper (Unknown mass)
● Washers (all the same size) or hooked masses
● Tape
● Stopwatch
● Safety Goggles
Free Body Diagrams
Guiding Questions:
How would you make the free body diagram?
What equations may apply to this lab?
In what ways will your materials be used? How do they apply to your chosen equations?
How will you be able to incorporate your variables and constants into a graph? What would the
x and y axes represent? What would the slope of the graph represent?
How will you be able to find the stretched distance?
Which concepts/constants apply to this lab?
A complete lab report must include:
❏ The materials you used and how you used them
❏ A detailed procedure describing how to setup the experiment
❏ Analysis of the data
❏ Explanation of your graph
❏ Is there a centrifugal force (a force acting away from the center) acting on the stopper?
❏ A conclusion:
❏ summarizing your results
❏ assessing any errors that may have affected your data
❏ discussing how you might improve the experiment and / or describing what
further experiments you might like to perform on this subject
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