6.

3 Experimental procedure

1
2.

gi

Go outside and firmly tight one end of a large string to a pole so that it could
not slide freely.

Stretch the string and place a dynamometer at the other end. You should be able to
use the
dynamometer to measure the tension you are applying to the string. Measure the
length of the
string while tight.

. Pull the string a few centimeters down to generate a pulse, and with a
chronometer measure

the time it takes the pulse to go to the other end of the string and come back.

. Repeat the time measurements at least 5 times for the same applied tension.
. Repeat the procedure for another 4 different tensions.

. Measure the mass and total length of the string.

6.4 Analysis

From the total length of the string and its corresponding mass, determine the
linear density of
the string.

For each applied tension, determine the average and uncertainty for the time it
took the pulse
to travel forth and back.

From the length of the string and the average time it took the pulse to travel
forth and back,
obtain the speed of the pulse and its corresponding uncertainty for all 5 different
tensions.

Plot the pulse speed (y axis) versus the square of the string tension (x axis) for
the 5 different
tensions, and fit a straight line to the data. From the slope of the fit obtain the
linear density
of the string (including its uncertainty).

How does it compare to the value you obtained in the first step of the analysis?
What is the
percentage error between those two values? The percentage error can be determined
as:

CrTOT per = lttcap — Hncol x100 . (6.7)

Hiheo

Why do you think could be a large source of error? Is the assumption of constant
linear mass
density a good one?
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