Grade:

Date:

Physics 204L

Heat Engine
NAME: ____________________________ SECTION: ________
P_NAME: __________________________ INSTRUCTOR: __________
Experimental procedure:
Part I: Boyles Law
Temperature= _________
Cross-sectional Area of cylinder A =_________
Piston position x ( Gas Pressure (
)

Volume of air in 1/V

cylinder V( )

Plot the pressure versus the inverse of volume. Do you get a straight line? If yes
determine using linear regression the slope of your straight line along with its associated
error. Find from the slope the number of moles of air inside the cylinder.

Part II: Heat Engine

Piston Diameter d = (32.5 0.1) mm
Mass of piston-and-platform= (35.00 0.06) g
Area of the cylinder A =

Before recording any data, run the experiment through a few cycles to get used to its
operation

Fill in the table below, record the cold and hot temperatures using the provided
thermometer. TC and T h .Also record the displacement h of the mass m=200 g produced
by the heat engine.
Trial

xA

xB

xC

PA ( )

xD

PB ( )

h( )

TC ( ) Th ( )

1
2
3
4

1. Determine the thermodynamic work done, for each trial. (Show a sample
calculation)
the work is the area under the parallelogram (when graphed on the computer)
W= area under parallelogram= (Pb-Pa) . (Vd-Va) volume is the area multiplied
by x values so we get the equation W= (Pb-Pa) . A(Xd-Xa)
Sample calculation for trial 1: W= (102,500-100,200) . 8.1 x 10^-4 (0.016-0)
=0.0298=0.03 J
W for trial 2= 0.0291J = 0.029J
W for trial 3= 0.0324J = 0.032J
W for trial 4= 0.0285J = 0.029J

2. Find the average value of the thermodynamic work done along with its rms
error.
using the calculator average work = 0.03J
also using calculator the error is = 6.1x10^-4
W= (0.03 +- 6.1x10^-4)

3. Calculate the mechanical work done in lifting the mass m=200g along with its
uncertainty. Compare this work to the work done by the thermodynamic cycle.
W=mgh

we need to use the total mass mass of piston plus the 200g all in kg

m= 0.2 + 0.035= 0.235 kg

W1= mgh= 0.235 x 9.8 x 0.038= 0.088J
W2= 0.235 x 9.8 x0.036= 0.083J
W3= 0.235 x 9.8 x 0.035= 0.081J
W4= 0.235 x 9.8 x 0.033= 0.080J
Average from calculator= 0.083J
Error = from calculator sigma X divided by radical N where N= number of trials
= 1.5 x10^-3
W= (0.083 +- 1.5 x 10^-3)
Thermodynamic work done is much less than the mechanical work as to be expected

4. What is the maximum theoretical thermal efficiency of the engine?

the maximum would be similar to that of a carnot engine so efficiency (e)
=1 - Tcold/Thot = for us to get a maximum efficiency we take the lowest Tcold and the
highest Thot from our values 24.8 and 98.2 (convert to kelvin by adding 273 to both)
e= 1 - (24.8+273/98.2+273)= 0.20 we multiply by 100 to get 20%

5. Is the heat engine we are dealing with a Carnot engine? Explain.

No, a Carnot engine is ideal so it would have an efficiency of 1 while we had an
efficiency of 0.2, also in the carnot cycle we have 2 adiabatic and 2 isothermic parts
while in our engine we had 2 adiabatic and 2 isobaric parts (as seen while performing the
experiment)