Projectile Relationships Lab

Projectile Relationships Lab

Purpose:

In this activity you will be investigating the relationships between some of the different variables involved in projectile motion.

Info:

  • Estimate your landing location by looking at the landing spot for the center of the bottom of the ball.
  •   Your three speedometers show you the total speed of the ball, the horizontal speed of the ball, and the vertical speed of the ball

Procedure

Part 1:  Learning to use the Program and reviewing Projectile Ideas

  1. Open the virtual projectile lab.
  2. With the speed set to 16 m/s, adjust the launch angle to 0° and the height to 24 meters.
  3. Keep your eye on the three speedometers during the flight of the projectile.  Describe in your lab book what happens to the total speed of the projectile, the horizontal speed of the projectile and the vertical speed of the projectile during the course of its flight.
  4. Put the launch angle at 90° and the height at zero.  Fire the projectile with a speed of 20 m/s.  Describe in your lab book what happens to the speed of the projectile when it reaches its maximum height and also what you notice about the speed of the projectile when it returns to the ground.
  5. Put your launch angle at 60°, your height at 15 m and your speed at 20 m/s.  Does the speed of the ball hit zero when the ball reach its highest height?  If not, why not?  Does the speed of the ball when it reaches the ground equal the speed of the ball at launch?  If not, why not?.
  6. Put your launch angle at 53°, your height at 0 m and your speed at 20 m/s.  Record the horizontal speed, the vertical speed and the total speed.  How can the total speed number be obtained from the numbers you have for horizontal speed and vertical speed?
  7. If you have answers for this lab, you can submit them for other students to compare their answers. Send them to allinonehomeschool@gmail.com. Tell me the course and lesson number (HS Physics, Lesson 23)!

Part 2:  Horizontal Projectiles Fired from a Fixed Height

  1. Set your height to 25 meters and your angle to 0°.  These variables will not be altered for the rest of this part of the experiment.
  2. Fire the projectile at 8 different speeds including a speed of 0 m/s.  For each speed record in a data table the speed you fired the projectile with, the horizontal distance it travelled, and the time of flight.
  3. In Logger Pro, create graphs of time of flight vs. speed and horizontal distance vs. speed.  Transfer both graphs to your lab book and make sure they have all the things a good graph should contain.
  4. Give a concluding sentence or two for this part of the lab.

Part 3:  Horizontal Projectiles Fired with a Fixed Speed

  1. Set your initial projectile speed to 25 m/s and your angle to 0°.  These variables will not be altered for the rest of this part of the experiment.
  2. Fire the projectile at 8 different heights including a height of 0 m.  For each height record in a data table the height from which you fired the projectile, the horizontal distance it travelled, and the time of flight.
  3. Create graphs of time of flight vs. height and horizontal distance vs. height.  Transfer both graphs to your lab book and make sure they have all the things a good graph should contain.
  4. Give a concluding sentence or two for this part of the lab.

Part 4:  Fired at an Angle from the Ground

  1. Set your initial projectile speed to 20 m/s and your height to 0 m.  These variables will not be altered for the rest of this part of the experiment.
  2. Fire your projectile at angles ranging from 0° to 90° using a 5° increments .  For each angle record in a data table the angle from which you fired the projectile, the horizontal distance it travelled, and the time of flight.
  3. Create graphs of time of flight vs. angle and horizontal distance vs. angle.  Transfer both graphs to your lab book and make sure they have all the things a good graph should contain except for equations. You should not try to curve fit these graphs.
  4. Give a concluding sentence or two for this part of the lab.
  5. If you have answers for this section, you can submit to them to allinonehomeschool@gmail.com to be shared with other students to compare answers.

(edited from source)