Verification of Newton's Second Law of

Motion by atwood machine

presented by_
Group-05
Experimental outline

• THEORY
• DIAGRAM
• EXPERIMENTAL DATA
• GRAPH
• RESULT
• DISCUSSION
Newton’s Second Law
• Newton's Second Law of Motion states that
the acceleration of an object is directly
proportional to the net force applied to it and
inversely proportional to its mass.

• It is expressed as Fnet,net force = ma.

• It implies that the greater the force applied to
an object, the greater its acceleration will be.
• The greater the mass, the harder the object is
to accelerate.
• The smaller the applied force acted on a body,
the smaller it’s acceleration will be.
 THEORY
• Considering the upward direction as positive, neglecting friction
and mass of the pulley, and applying Newton's law of motion we get
• for M:Fnet = Mg - T = Ma
• for m:Fnet = T - mg = ma
• Solving these two equations, we get the theoretical acceleration as
• ath = 𝑔 𝑀+𝑚 (M-m)
• second law we get,
• ath ∝ (M - m)
• According to figure applying the as acceleration due to gravity g is
constant in a particular place and taking total mass (M+m) constant
for the Atwood machine ,according to newton’s second law we get
,knowledge of equations of motion (D=ut +1/2 at2 ), we can
calculate the experimental acceleration by
• aex = 2𝐷 / t2
DIAGRAM
EXPERIMENTAL DATA

M M Height Time, t Mean Time, t aexp = 2D /t 2 ath = (M – m)

(gm) (gm) (cm) (s) (s) ( cm.s- 2) (M − m)/ (M + m) g (gm)
( cm.s- 2)
500 200 68.5 0.47 0.53 487.71 420 300
0.56
0.57
475 225 68.5 0.49 0.57 421.66 350 250
0.54
0.69
450 250 68.5 0.59 0.63 341.8 280 200
0.63
0.68
425 275 68.5 0.67 0.71 271.77 210 150
0.75
0.71
400 300 68.5 0.76 0.85 189.61 140 100
0.85
0.95
375 325 68.5 0.99 1.09 117.83 70 50
1.09
GRAPH
Acceleration vs M-m
600

500
Acceleration (cm/s2)

400

300

200

100

0
0 50 100 150 200 250 300 350
M-m (gm)
 RESULT
From the ‘acceleration vs mass difference’ graph, the relationship
between experimental acceleration and mass difference is Linear
relationship for the Atwood machine same as the theory says. Thus, we
can say that Newton’s second law is verified.
 DISCUSSION
• Readings might not have been taken to eye level for measuring
height.
• Reaction time while taking reading brom sop-watch might have
abbeeted our resull.
• Take minimum 3 reading of time from a stop-watch and then
calculate mean value to minimize errors.
• As there are lots of variable, calculation should be done carefully.
• The string wasn't moving freely because of frictional problem.