5TH PRACTICE: SLIDING

FRICTION COEFFICIENT
Yumeng Ji
Irene Cano
Nerea Rasche
ABOUT NEWTON
+ He was born in Woolsthorpe, Lincolnshire, England
+ The date of his birth is in the early hours of December 25, 1642 (January 4,
1643, according to the Gregorian calendar)
+ He did not know his father, because he died in October, 1642, When his
mother married Barnabas Smith, who had no intention of taking a three-year-old
child, he left her in the care of his grandmother, Margery Ayscough.
+ He entered the University of Cambridge at the age of nineteen. He often didn’t
go to classes because he preferred to spend time in the library. He graduated
from Trinity College.
+ In 1665, at the age of 22, he obtained his bachelor's degree and made his first
mathematical discovery, discovering the general binomial theorem.
MORE ABOUT NEWTON

+ A culminating moment in the history of Physics was Isaac Newton's discovery of the
Law of Universal Gravitation: all objects attract each other with a force directly
proportional to the product of their masses and inversely proportional to the square
of the distance. that separates their centers. By subjecting the most important
physical phenomena of the observable universe to a single mathematical law,
Newton demonstrated that terrestrial physics and celestial physics are the same
thing. The concept of gravitation achieved in one fell swoop:
- Reveal the physical meaning of Kepler's three laws of planetary motion, It has
been really useful to calculate the movement of planets around the Sun, or of
satellites orbiting around the earth.
- Solve the intricate problem of the origin of the tides
- To account for Galileo Galilei's curious and inexplicable observation that the motion
of an object in free fall is independent of its weight.
MORE ABOUT NEWTON
+ In the book Philosophiæ naturalis principia mathematica (1687) the law of
gravitation is described. He must have been 20 years old to publish the book.
+ There are 3 laws:
1) The planets make elliptical motions around the Sun and the Sun is placed in one of
the 2 foci with an ellipse.
2) The area of the planet's radius is proportional to the time used to make the
perimeter of these areas
3) The square of the Sun in the period of the planet's orbits is proportional to the
average distance from the cube
+ Yes, despite being a physicist, mathematician and chemist, he was a philosopher,
theologian and alchemist. At that time people were learning a lot of areas.
+ He died on 31 March 1727 in Kensington, London, United Kingdom.
MATERIALS
WOODEN BOARD:
We have cut this box, so that we have been left with a board
with which we have done the experiment. We have calculated
the frictional coefficient of the board, which is 0,36. It is a normal
wooden box with a lentz of 0.6 meters.

DYNAMOMETER:
We have used it so we could measure forces of the objects. We
have placed the box with the bottle inside on top of the table and
we have hooked the dynamometer and it has indicated the force
with each amount of mass that we have put, the spring was
moving more or less depending on the force. The traditional
dynamometer, invented by Isaac Newton, bases its operation on
the stretching of a spring that follows Hooke's law of elasticity in
the measurement range.
MATERIALS
CARDBOARD BOX: We have used this box to move it along the wooden one so we
can calculate the frictional coefficient. We have put inside a water bottle and we have
changed the amount of water, to do the experiment with different masses.

PROTRACTOR: As the whole members didn’t have a physical protractor,

we have downloaded this app that works as one of them. In this way, we have been
able to calculate the angles, and so the frictional coefficient. A protractor is an
instrument that measures angles in degrees and comes in two basic presentations:
Semicircular shaped protractor graduated at 180° or 360°. It is more common than
circular, but it has the limitation that when measuring concave angles, a double
measurement has to be made.
MATERIALS

PLASTIC BOTTLE:

We have used it by putting it inside the cardboard box and we

have changed it mass by adding or removing some water.

BALANCE:

We have needed it to measure the mass of our forces. It works

thanks to a system of sensors, also called load cells. Because
of these, strain gauges, which are also sensors, resist the
exerted weight and interpret it.
HORIZONTAL SURFACE:
Mass(kg) Weight(P) Normal F Frictional coefficient
force(N)
1 1kg 9,8N 9,8N 3,5N 0,36

2 2kg 19,6N 19,6N 7N 0,36

3 3kg 29,4N 29,4N 10,5N 0,36

4 4kg 39,2N 39,2N 14N 0,36

The mean: 0,36 The standard deviation: 0

INCLINED SURFACE:
Mass(kg) Weight(P) Angle(º) Px Py Frictional Acceleration
coefficient
1 1kg 9,8N 19,9º 3,33N 9,21N 0,36 0m/s2

2 2kg 19,6N 25º 8,28N 17,76N 0,36 0,95 m/s2

3 3kg 29,4N 30º 14,7N 25,46N 0,36 1,84 m/s2

4 4kg 39,2N 45º 27,72N 27,72N 0,36 4,43 m/s2

The mean: 0,36 The standard deviation: 0

CALCULATING THE FRICTIONAL COEFFICIENT:

HORIZONTAL SURFACE

Description of the process

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Pjsa_7XQRlJ2Rp6T1COAQB-yeJCO8DCJ/
view?usp=sharing
INCLINED SURFACE
Knowing the mass of an object that slides down an inclined plane where we also know
the angle and the coefficient of friction of that surface. We know this last one because it
is a constant for each material, so it is not necessary to calculate it, so we can calculate
the acceleration using Newton's law. Newton's law says that the sum of the forces that
occur in the direction of motion is equal to the mass times the acceleration. there are two
forces involved: one in favor of the movement, which is the Px (component of the weight
in the direction of movement), and another against, which is the Fr. To calculate, the Fr is
multiplied by the coefficient of friction by the normal, that the normal is the Py component
of the weight. We need to calculate the acceleration, because except in the first case,
where the bottle only weighs one kilo and the angle is 19.8 degrees, in all other cases
the box is sliding downwards and we don't know its acceleration, but the coefficient of
friction will always be the same, it does not change, since it is the same material. In the
first case it is the only one in which we do not calculate the acceleration, because it is
precisely from that angle that it begins to move, but it is still stationary, so we know that
the acceleration is zero, but it helps us to realize that the coefficient of friction is 0.36.
The mean and standard deviation will be the same as in the horizontal plane, since we
have obtained the same results, because the coefficient of friction is a constant.
CONCLUSIONS
IS THE FRICTIONAL COEFFICIENT THE SAME VALUE FOR BOTH OF
EXPERIMENTS? WHY?
Yes, because the coefficient of friction is first of all a constant that only
depends on one thing: the type of surface material. If the surface material
does not change, the value is constant regardless of mass, angle, or any
other value.
CONCLUSIONS
WHICH IS THE MATERIAL OF THE SURFACE YOU’VE USED? IS THE FRICTIONAL
COEFFICIENT RELATED TO THAT MATERIAL?
- The material of the surface which we used is wood.
- Yes, the frictional coefficient depends on the materials used.
For example, ice on steel has a low coefficient of friction, the materials slide past
each other easily; while rubber on pavement has a high coefficient of friction, the
materials do not slide past each other easily.
This has a coefficient of friction of 0.45. But because the wood in the box is
polished, the coefficient of friction is lower, in this case, 0,36. It also has a static
value of 0.6 but without specifying addresses.
The coefficient of friction only depends on the material and for each type of material
it is a fixed or constant value.
CONCLUSIONS
COULD YOU EXPLAIN ANOTHER METHOD TO CALCULATE THE FRICTIONAL
COEFFICIENT?
HORIZONTAL PLANE

If we know in a horizontal plane from which acceleration the movement starts, the
coefficient of friction is equal to the division of that acceleration by gravity.

FR = μ · N
ΣFy: N - P = 0 → N - m · g = 0 → N = m · g
ΣFx: -FR + F = 0 → -FR = -m · a
-m · a = μ · N
-m · a = μ · m · g
-a = (μ · m · g)/m
-a = μ · g → μ = -a/g
INCLINED PLANE
The coefficient of friction of a mass moving down an inclined plane is calculated
as the tangent of the angle of inclination.

Px - Fr = 0 m g sen a - u . N = 0
Py = N m g cos a = N

m g sen a - u . m g cos a = 0

sen a = u . cos a

sen a : cos a = u = tg a a