Finding the Acceleration Due to Gravity

Purpose: To find the acceleration due to gravity (g) using two different experimental methods.

Materials:

Use LoggerPro (or equivalent Mac version) and any combination of the following: photogate(s), motion detector, picket fence*, Atwood machine** made with a Smart Pulley*** and slotted weights & hangers, pendulum, ramp, stopwatch, metric ruler, rubber ball, ball bearing (or anything else you can think of)

**Atwood's machine is a device where two masses, M and m, are connected by a string passing over a pulley.

Write-up requirements:

You do not need to write a full lab report for this. Explain your experimental method and include data, graphs and calculations. Compare your values of g to the accepted value (look it up in your book or online).

Suggestion: If you can’t think of two methods to find g on your own, do some internet research. Look up things like the simple pendulum and Atwood’s Machine on Hyperphysics to see a mathematical treatment.

http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/

Caveats – If the LoggerPro experiment file you load automatically calculates acceleration for you, you MUST show how to get acceleration from the raw data (i.e. position and time). Also, do NOT drop hard things on the motion detectors.