General Physics Experiment Report

Projectile Motion

Purpose
To determine the value of the acceleration due to gravity. The other experiment was to study the
elastic and inelastic impact of collision of two objects on the air table. This then helped to
determine the nature of the collision whether it was elastic or inelastic.

Introduction
A collision refers to a brief interaction between two bodies. It is assumed that this interaction takes place
in the space of a certain, short length of time and that the bodies do not affect one another in any other
way. If no other forces are present, the two bodies will move at constant velocities both before and after
the collision. Since the two bodies may be regarded as a closed system, the interaction must obey the laws
of conservation of momentum and conservation of energy.
 Materials/methods
Apparatus: digital Camera, 2 Pucks, Computer Software, Air table, 30 cm ruler

Procedure

Figure 1.
1. We elevated one side an air table to an inclination angle of θ and the other side stayed on the
same level as shown in Figure1.
2. Then a puck will be thrown at an angle θ from one corner of the table to make a projectile
motion that formed a parabolic shape movement.

3. The entire motion of the object was recorded using a digital camera. Then the video was
transferred to the computer and analyzed using a tracker software. The y-axis was set to
velocity measured in meters per second (m/s) whilst the y-axis was set to time measured in
seconds (s).

4. we measured θ and V0 = 0.638923 to calculate the acceleration a.

a=g ∙ sinθ
Where g is the magnitude of the gravitational acceleration (g = 9.81 m/s2 )

5. A graph was plotted using the formula:

1
y=V 0 t + ( a t 2) + S .
2
where S isthe constant tha is eaual ¿
Where S is the constant that is equal to 0.22875

6. By using the results from the experiment, the percentage error was calculated using the
equation:
 gtheo −gexp
% Error= ×100 %
gtheo

Results
t x y v a K U E
0.00E+00 2.24E-01 -1.43E-01     0 -1.11E-01 -1.11E-01
4.17E-02 2.49E-01 -1.57E-01 6.72E-01   0.22568 -1.21E-01 1.04E-01
1.42E+0
8.34E-02 2.73E-01 -1.70E-01 6.65E-01 0.220898 -1.32E-01 8.89E-02
0
1.25E-01 2.97E-01 -1.84E-01 7.45E-01 3.50E-01 0.277234 -1.43E-01 1.34E-01
1.47E+0
1.67E-01 3.30E-01 -1.95E-01 7.08E-01 0.250961 -1.51E-01 9.97E-02
0
2.19E+0
2.09E-01 3.51E-01 -2.08E-01 5.87E-01 0.172113 -1.61E-01 1.07E-02
0
2.50E-01 3.72E-01 -2.21E-01 5.82E-01 3.84E-01 0.169429 -1.71E-01 -1.86E-03
2.92E-01 3.92E-01 -2.34E-01 5.63E-01 7.43E-01 0.158707 -1.82E-01 -2.29E-02
3.34E-01 4.11E-01 -2.47E-01 5.31E-01 7.77E-01 0.140784 -1.92E-01 -5.11E-02
3.75E-01 4.28E-01 -2.60E-01 5.03E-01 7.35E-01 0.126273 -2.02E-01 -7.54E-02
4.17E-01 4.44E-01 -2.73E-01 4.80E-01 6.62E-01 0.114961 -2.12E-01 -9.68E-02
4.59E-01 4.59E-01 -2.85E-01 4.51E-01 8.25E-01 0.101763 -2.21E-01 -1.20E-01
5.01E-01 4.73E-01 -2.97E-01 4.27E-01 8.12E-01 0.091097 -2.31E-01 -1.40E-01
5.42E-01 4.84E-01 -3.10E-01 4.04E-01 8.05E-01 0.081664 -2.41E-01 -1.59E-01
5.84E-01 4.95E-01 -3.22E-01 3.66E-01 5.99E-01 0.067139 -2.50E-01 -1.83E-01
6.26E-01 5.05E-01 -3.33E-01 3.48E-01 4.61E-01 0.060643 -2.58E-01 -1.97E-01
6.67E-01 5.14E-01 -3.44E-01 3.52E-01 6.07E-01 0.061902 -2.67E-01 -2.05E-01
7.09E-01 5.23E-01 -3.56E-01 3.32E-01 6.73E-01 0.055064 -2.76E-01 -2.21E-01
7.51E-01 5.29E-01 -3.67E-01 3.06E-01 7.01E-01 0.046927 -2.85E-01 -2.38E-01
7.92E-01 5.36E-01 -3.78E-01 2.89E-01 7.13E-01 0.041838 -2.93E-01 -2.51E-01
8.34E-01 5.40E-01 -3.89E-01 2.69E-01 6.04E-01 0.036089 -3.02E-01 -2.66E-01
8.76E-01 5.44E-01 -3.99E-01 2.63E-01 5.54E-01 0.034623 -3.10E-01 -2.75E-01
9.18E-01 5.47E-01 -4.10E-01 2.61E-01 7.53E-01 0.034012 -3.18E-01 -2.84E-01
9.59E-01 5.48E-01 -4.20E-01 2.46E-01 6.97E-01 0.030142 -3.26E-01 -2.96E-01
1.00E+00 5.48E-01 -4.30E-01 2.45E-01 4.38E-01 0.029905 -3.34E-01 -3.04E-01
1.04E+00 5.47E-01 -4.41E-01 2.46E-01 4.71E-01 0.030271 -3.42E-01 -3.12E-01
1.08E+00 5.46E-01 -4.51E-01 2.41E-01 7.24E-01 0.029137 -3.50E-01 -3.21E-01
1.13E+00 5.44E-01 -4.61E-01 2.43E-01 7.23E-01 0.029592 -3.57E-01 -3.28E-01
1.17E+00 5.40E-01 -4.70E-01 2.54E-01 6.77E-01 0.0323 -3.65E-01 -3.32E-01
1.21E+00 5.35E-01 -4.80E-01 2.66E-01 6.11E-01 0.035291 -3.72E-01 -3.37E-01
1.25E+00 5.28E-01 -4.89E-01 2.72E-01 5.58E-01 0.037118 -3.79E-01 -3.42E-01
1.29E+00 5.21E-01 -4.98E-01 2.80E-01 5.89E-01 0.039199 -3.86E-01 -3.47E-01
1.33E+00 5.14E-01 -5.07E-01 3.03E-01 6.91E-01 0.045894 -3.93E-01 -3.48E-01
 1.38E+00 5.04E-01 -5.17E-01 3.25E-01 7.14E-01 0.052914 -4.01E-01 -3.48E-01
1.42E+00 4.94E-01 -5.26E-01 3.43E-01 6.40E-01 0.058916 -4.08E-01 -3.49E-01
1.46E+00 4.82E-01 -5.35E-01 3.63E-01 6.47E-01 0.065844 -4.15E-01 -3.49E-01
1.50E+00 4.69E-01 -5.44E-01 3.81E-01 5.44E-01 0.072498 -4.22E-01 -3.49E-01
1.54E+00 4.56E-01 -5.52E-01 3.96E-01 5.42E-01 0.078542 -4.29E-01 -3.50E-01
1.58E+00 4.41E-01 -5.61E-01 4.17E-01 5.92E-01 0.087139 -4.35E-01 -3.48E-01
1.63E+00 4.26E-01 -5.70E-01 4.42E-01 7.39E-01 0.097606 -4.42E-01 -3.45E-01
1.67E+00 4.09E-01 -5.79E-01 4.68E-01 6.52E-01 0.109463 -4.49E-01 -3.39E-01
1.71E+00 3.91E-01 -5.87E-01 4.92E-01 5.51E-01 0.121269 -4.56E-01 -3.34E-01
1.75E+00 3.72E-01 -5.96E-01 5.08E-01 4.41E-01 0.128934 -4.62E-01 -3.33E-01
1.79E+00 3.52E-01 -6.05E-01 5.26E-01 6.00E-01 0.138398 -4.69E-01 -3.31E-01
1.84E+00 3.31E-01 -6.13E-01 5.52E-01 8.99E-01 0.152551 -4.76E-01 -3.23E-01
1.88E+00 3.09E-01 -6.22E-01 5.98E-01 7.95E-01 0.178679 -4.82E-01 -3.04E-01
1.92E+00 2.85E-01 -6.31E-01 6.23E-01 4.43E-01 0.194116 -4.90E-01 -2.96E-01
1.96E+00 2.61E-01 -6.40E-01 6.27E-01   0.19681 -4.97E-01 -3.00E-01
2.00E+00 2.36E-01 -6.49E-01     0 -5.04E-01 -5.04E-01
0.63892251
V0
2
8.90013419
g
3
0.22875010
S
2

The table above shows the result s of the projectile motion experiment.

Percentage error equation for the experiment acceleration due to gravity is:
gtheo −gexp
% Error= ×100 %
gtheo

9.8−8.9
% Error= × 100 %=9 %
9.8
 Discussion
The initial velocity of the puck is 0.638 m/s. During the experiment the puck accelerated towards
of the center of the raised table there was a gravitational force that pulls the puck towards the
center of the earth. It is slowed down by the gravitational force therefore decreasing its kinetic
energy while it gained potential energy. When the puck reached its highest point, it had a
velocity of zero. The gravitational force accelerated the puck downwards to form a parabolic
shape motion.
The equation used to calculation the percentage error of the experimental gravitational force: it
was found that the experimental gravitational force was 8.900 m/s2. By theory, the value of the
gravitational force is 9.8 m/s2. Therefore, there was an error of 9% which might have been cause
by other external forces that acted on the puck such as the frictional force between the puck and
the table. Also, the percentage error may had been caused by inaccurate readings by the software.
To improve the efficiency of the experiment, it should have been done numerous times and get
the average value of the gravitational force.

Conclusion
The experiment helped to determine the value of the acceleration due to gravity that was found to
be 8.900 m/s2. This 9% error from the 9.8 m /s2 was expected.
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