Swinging Pendulum (for High School)
This activity shows students the engineering importance of understanding the laws of mechanical energy. More specifically, it demonstrates how potential energy can be converted to kinetic energy and back again. Given a pendulum height, students calculate and predict how fast the pendulum will swing by using the equations for potential and kinetic energy. The equations will be justified as students experimentally measure the speed of the pendulum and compare theory with reality.
Students examine swinging pendulums and their conservation of energyCopyright Wikimedia Commons http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/24/Oscillating_pendulum.gif
Mechanical engineers design a wide range of consumer and industry devices — transportation vehicles, home appliances, computer hardware, factory equipment — that use mechanical motion. The design of equipment for demolition purposes is another example. Similar to the movement of a pendulum, an enormous wrecking ball when held at a height possesses potential energy, and as it falls, its potential energy is converted to kinetic energy. As the wrecking ball makes contact with the structure to be destroyed, it transfers that energy to flatten or take down the structure.
After this activity, students should be able to:
- Understand the concepts of potential and kinetic energy.
- Relate concepts of kinetic and potential energy to real life examples, as well as to engineering examples.
- Understand that a pendulum has a specific period, regardless of where the weight on the pendulum is started, or how much it weighs.
- Use the concepts of kinetic energy, potential energy, and conservation of energy to perform an experiment to determine an object's velocity.