Specific Heat Capacity

specific heat capacity of water = 4200 Jkg-1C-1 or 4.2Jg-1C-1.

1) The amount of heat required to raise the temperature of a block of aluminium by 9K is
9000J. What is the heat capacity of the aluminium block?
2) What is the ratio of the heat capacity of 10g of water to the heat capacity of 1 kg of water?
3) Calculate the amount of heat required to heat 80g of water from 15C to 35C.
4) The specific capacity of copper is 400 Jkg-1C-1. Calculate the amount of heat given out
when a piece of copper of mass 2kg is cooled from 150C to 50C.
5) 24 kg of oil is heated from 30C to 40C in 20s. The specific heat capacity of oil is 8 Jkg-
1
C-1. What is the power of the heater?
6) A piece of metal of mass 0.4kg and temperature 50C is placed in water of mass 0.2 kg
and temperature 25C. If the final temperature is 30C, what is the specific heat capacity of
the metal?
7) What is the final temperature of the mixture if 100g of water at 70C is added to 200g of
cold water at 10C and well stirred?
8) A 50W electric heater heats up a metal block of mass 0.6 kg from 20C to 45C in 90s.
Calculate the specific heat capacity of the metal.
9) A lead bullet moving at a velocity of 200 ms-1 hits a sand bag. The temperature of the lead
bullet rises by 50C. Calculate the s.h.c of the bullet. State any assumptions you made.
10) A kettle rated at 2 kW takes 200s to raise the temperature of 800g of water by 80.0 °C.
Calculate the mean rate at which energy is lost to the surroundings.

specific heat capacity of water = 4200 Jkg-1°C-1;

specific heat capacity of ice = 2100 Jkg-1°C-1
specific latent heat of fusion of ice = 336 000 Jkg-1
specific latent heat of vaporisation of water = 2260000 Jkg-1

1) How much energy is needed to change (i) 5 kg of ice into water at the same temperature,
(ii) 5 kg of water into water vapour at the same temperature?
2) 160g of molten silver at its melting point, 960°C, is allowed to solidify at the same
temperature and gives out 16800J of heat. What is the specific latent heat of silver?
3) Calculate the amount of heat needed to change 0.50 kg of water at 20 °C to steam at
100 °C.
4) Calculate the amount of heat required to change 4 kg of ice at 0 °C to water at 50 °C?
5) Calculate the heat required to convert 2kg of ice at -12 °C to steam at 100 °C
6) A 460W water heater is used to boil water. Assuming no heat losses, what mass of steam
will it produce in 10 minutes?
7) An immersion heater is placed into 1 kg of water which is at a temperature of 25 °C. The
temperature of the water rises to 100 °C in 315 seconds and the water starts to boil.
(i) What is the power of the heater?
(ii) How long will it take to boil away all the water?
8) A refrigerator can convert 400 g of water at 20 °C to ice at -10 °C in 3 hours. Find the
average rate of heat extraction from the water in J/s
9) A beaker contains 200 g of water at 15 °C. 25 g of ice at 0°C is added to the water which is
stirred until the ice is completely melted, Calculate the lowest temperature of the mixture,
assuming that all the heat to melt the ice is taken from the water and that no heat enters or
leaves the system.
10) A glass of lemonade of mass 0.2 kg is initially at 30 °C. 50 g of ice at 0 °C is added to
the lemonade and all of it melts. What is the final temperature of the lemonade?
 temperature
F

boiling point
D E

melting point
B C

A
time
0
AB: Solid State
BC: mixture of solid and liquid (melting)
CD: Liquid State
DE: mixture of liquid and gas (boiling)
EF: Gaseous state

temperature

condensing point
Q R

freezing point
S T

S time
0