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Conservation of Mechanical Energy Using Pendulum

This document provides instructions for using a PHET simulation to determine whether mechanical energy is conserved in a pendulum. Students are asked to collect data on the kinetic and potential energy of the pendulum at various points in its swing and graph the results. By observing that the sum of kinetic and potential energy remains constant, even when friction is introduced, students can demonstrate the law of conservation of mechanical energy. Changing the length, mass, or gravity of the pendulum validates that this principle holds true in different conditions.

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Sunita Sindhu
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274 views3 pages

Conservation of Mechanical Energy Using Pendulum

This document provides instructions for using a PHET simulation to determine whether mechanical energy is conserved in a pendulum. Students are asked to collect data on the kinetic and potential energy of the pendulum at various points in its swing and graph the results. By observing that the sum of kinetic and potential energy remains constant, even when friction is introduced, students can demonstrate the law of conservation of mechanical energy. Changing the length, mass, or gravity of the pendulum validates that this principle holds true in different conditions.

Uploaded by

Sunita Sindhu
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Conservation of Mechanical Energy using the Pendulum Lab

Task
Determine whether or not mechanical energy is conserved as a pendulum swings. The length and mass
of the pendulum will be held constant.

Main Link: https://phet.colorado.edu/en/simulation/pendulum-lab


INSTRUCTIONS:
PART I: Setting up and hypothesis:
Go to the PHET Pendulum lab and select “Lab”. If you have never used this application
before you might want to play around with the “Intro” and “Energy” screens first.

On the right, leave Length, Mass, Gravity and Friction alone for now. At the bottom left,
turn on the ruler and the timer. At the top left, turn on the Energy Graph.

Play with the pendulum and watch how the KE and PE bars change. You might want to
change the speed (lower center) to “Slow”.

Make a preliminary statement that describes how these two bars are related to each
other and how these relationships change as the pendulum moves through its cycle.
PART II: The Experiment

At the lower center, turn the speed to “Slow”. At the left, drag the ruler to the KE/PE
bar graph. Have pencil and paper and prepare to take data.

As the pendulum swings, collect data on time and the height of both KE and PE bars at
various locations:

Location Time, in Kinetic Energy, Potential Energy,


Of Pendulum Bob seconds in cm in cm
Farthest Right

Bottom Dead Center

Farthest Left

Data point of your


choice 1
Data point of your
choice 2
Data point of your
choice 3
Data point of your
choice 4

Make a line graph using Excel, or any graphing application of your choice of the KE vs
time, and, on the same graph in a different color, PE vs time.

PART II: Analysis


1. Was your measure of KE and PE in cm a direct or an indirect measurement of the
energy?

2. Look at your graph. If you were to add a third line, representing the sum of KE and
PE at any given point, what would it look like?

3. Which law or principle are you demonstrating in #1?


4. Do you think this would hold true if you changed the length of the string? Try it.
(just watch the bars to see if your idea if validated, you do not have to graph it)

5. Do you think this would hold true if you changed the mass? Gravity? Try them.

6. At what point is the PE the greatest?

7. At what point is the KE the greatest?

8. At what points is V (velocity) the highest and the lowest?

9. What is the relationship between KE and V?

10. So far we have not dealt with the internal friction of the string. On the right-hand
side change the amount of friction (it might take a bit) and watch what happens. If
you don’t get an additional red bar you might need to adjust the length or gravity to
increase the height of the KE+PE bars.

11. Also you have a 3rd bar – Etotal. What three things make up the total E of the system?

12. What kind of energy is converted to the red bar? Which energy (KE or PE) does it
come from?

13. What happens to the motion of the pendulum as the Etotal increases? (Keep this in
mind in a few chapters when we get into the 3rd law of thermodynamics).

14. Summary: go back to your original hypothesis in Part I and re-write it if necessary.

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