Marissa Birus, Luke Johnson, Allison Kapoll, Adam Webb

Physics Lab 5 Measuring Frictional Force

September 21, 2017

Experimental Question:
1. Our first question is what is the accepted model of frictional force?

2. Our second question is what are the static coefficients of friction for the block of wood
and the wood plank incline?

Prediction:
Hypothesis: If we are correct that m*g*cosӨ = N and m*g*sinӨ = f than graph of Fnormal vs
Fmaximum static will look like the following figure.
The figure above explains that the Fmaximum static is the intercept; therefore, the static force is
constant until it reaches a breaking point. Furthermore, our experiment is to prove that there is
an increasing slope related to fs = F. Meaning as the mass increases as does the normal force.
The following picture is a free body diagram for this experiment.
We obtained the equations for normal force and frictional force by looking at the free body
diagram. Then we found the x and y components then entered the data into the following
equations:

Method and Data Collection:

1. Placed the block on the woodend incline which was initially placed on the lab table.
Slowly raise the incline until the block started to move and recorded the angle at that
point. Preceded to repeat that process three times in order to receive the most accurate
results.
a. In order to receive an accurate angle measurement we used an iphone as a
protractor.
 2. Repeated step #1 four times, we added 100g to the block every time.
a. We made three angle measurement involving 100g, 200g, 300g, and 400g.

There was possible error since we measured the angle using a phone app. The app could only
measure to the one’s place. Furthermore, when we weighed the wooden block, we could only
measure precisely to the tenth’s place of a gram. There is another possible error since the tape
needed to attach the weight to the wooden block. Another source of error could have been while
we were lifting up the wooden plank and increasing the angle. We could have caused the block
to slide prematurely by bumping the wood.

Figure 1: Data collected from experiment.

Analysis:

Figure 2:Data and calculations for experiment.

To find the normal force for this experiment, we took the mass of the wooden block and
the weight added if any and multiplied by acceleration of gravity and the cos of the angle. For
the frictional force we did the same calculations but did the sin of the angle instead. To find the
error we used the following two equations:

Note: Data and calculations results are in excel spreadsheet located on the same folder as this
document.

Conclusion:
In conclusion we find that as mass increases as does the normal force. Meaning the
maximum frictional static force is proportional to μs and the normal force. By measuring the
static frictional force and plotting it against the normal force, we were able to find the following
figures:

Figure 3:Results
 From the above information, it is easy to see that the normal force is linearly related to
the static force. We found the percent error for the normal and frictional force in figure three
above. In these figures we also propagated our own uncertainties. A good way to improve this
experiment would be to have a device that moves the incline at a constant amount. In addition,
adding a motion detector to sense the initial movement would block down the incline. Also a
more precise protractor would benefit the takeaway results. Finally, a possible follow up
experiment could be to test the kinetic frictional force of the same experiment and compare the
static frictional force with the kinetic frictional force.