The Swinging Ring Experiment

The goal of this experiment is to predict the time it takes a large metal ring to swing back and forth.

You will have a set of 2 small- and medium-sized rings, as well as basic lab equipment: a ruler, meterstick, stopwatch, bars and clamps. You may combine your measurements with those of other groups to create a larger dataset.

Can you use the small rings to make measurements from which you might figure out the behavior of the large ring? That's your job. At the end of the class period, I'll swing one of the large rings and we'll all measure its period. The students whose estimate is closest will be recognized for their work.

As you work through this experiment, consider the following:

1. how well can you determine the size of a ring?
2. how well can you determine the period of a ring?
3. is there some way that a graph might help?

Each group must hand in (stapled together, with names)

• a table of measurements
• a graph
• a prediction for the period of the big ring

This experiment brings up some topics that we will address over and over again throughout this quarter:

• how to combine several measurements of the same quantity
• using the proper number of figures
• creating an informative graph

We might also learn something useful about logarithms ...

Copyright © Michael Richmond. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License.