Lab: Conservation of Mechanical Energy (25 points)

Objectives

After you have completed this laboratory, you will be able to:
 Describe the energy transfers that occur as a marble moves through a track.
 Calculate the gravitational potential energy of an object.
 Apply the conservation of energy principle to find how much energy is
transferred to an unusable form.
 Calculate quantities using the work-energy theorem to take into account
friction.

Introduction

The law of conservation of energy states that energy can be neither created nor
destroyed. It can, however, be transferred from one form to another. For example, a
falling rock transfers its gravitational potential energy to kinetic energy during the fall. If
there are no external forces acting on the object, the total initial energy will equal the
total final energy. To decide what energies are present at any time in a system, ask
yourself:
o “Is it moving?” If yes, then the system has kinetic energy.
o “Is it above the ground?” If yes, then the system has gravitational
potential energy.
o “Are there any springs or elastics stretched or compressed?” If yes, then
the system has elastic potential energy.
In a system where there are external forces acting on an object, such as friction, the total
initial energy plus or minus any work done by the external forces will equal the total final
energy. First, find the total initial and final energies of the system by asking yourself the
above questions. Then determine if there are any external forces, such as someone
pushing or friction. If so, then the work done by that external force transfers energy to
the system (positive work) or takes energy from the system (negative work).

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Purpose of This Lab

The purpose of this lab is to describe the energy transfers that occur for a marble on a
track, determine how the final height to which a marble rolls on a track is related to the
initial height of release, and determine what percentage of initial energy is dissipated due
to friction.

Questions

1 A teacher ties a bowling ball to a long rope suspended from the ceiling. She pulls
the heavy ball back like a pendulum until the ball touches the tip of her nose. She
then releases it and lets it swing. When the ball returns to her, she doesn’t even
flinch as it nears her face. Why isn’t she scared?

Because she is sure the bowling ball will not hit her face because the law of
conservation of energy demonstrates that the ball will not go higher than its
starting point.

Hypothesis

After reading the lab instructions but before starting the lab, record your best “educated
guess” about what will happen in the experiment. Write the hypothesis as an “if-then”
statement. Give your reasons and outline any assumptions that lead you to this
hypothesis.

If the initial height increases, then the average final height will also increase; however,
the average final height will be about ¾ of the initial height.

Experiment: Conservation of Mechanical Energy

In this lab you will create a marble roller coaster track from pipe insulation. First you will
explore the energy transfers of the marble as it moves through the track. Next, you will
release a marble from different heights on a u-shaped track and measure the height it
reaches to on the other side. Finally, you will graph your data to find out what percentage
of initial available energy was transferred out of the system due to work done by the
friction force.

Materials

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  Foam pipe insulation from a home improvement store (8-feet long for 1-inch
diameter pipe)
 Scissors
 Masking Tape
 Marble
 Tape measure

Safety Precautions

Be safe as you work on this or any lab. Follow these steps to safely conduct the
experiment:
 Be careful using the scissors while slicing the pipe insulation.
 If taping to any surfaces in your home, be sure to ask for permission and be
careful not to damage any of the surfaces.

Getting Started

 Gather all the materials for the lab.

 The pipe insulation comes as a cylinder. You will need to split the insulation in
half (lengthwise) along the scored mark. Then you should cut the insulation in
half (lengthwise) exactly opposite the original split so that you get two long U-
shaped marble tracks.

Procedure

1 Begin by exploring with the tracks and marble. Create a roller coaster track and let
your marble ride. You can tape to a wall or other high place. Use any other
materials you have to prop up hills and create loops. It is fun to have a big finish,
such as a jump into a cup, knocking over dominos, or even popping a balloon.
2 In your data section, draw a sketch of your coaster. Choose four places in your
coaster and label the energies present at those locations, as well as relative
amounts of each energy type tracked in a pie chart for each location. The pie chart
represents the total amount of energy the object has at that point. You can ignore
friction for this part to make the pie charts easier.

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3 Next, take only one piece of track and create a U-shaped track that touches the
ground at the bottom. It will rise about 80 cm up on each side. You can tape to the
wall, a chair, or some other tall object.
4 Before you begin collecting data, let your marble roll from one side of the track to
the other. Be sure the marble moves on the track instead of free-falling down the
track. You may have to adjust the track to be a bit more slanted if necessary. Do
your best to make the track symmetrical.
5 Choose an initial release height for your marble. Record this value in meters in your
data table. You may also wish to mark this point with tape.
6 Release the marble and then measure the height to which it reaches on the
opposite side. Record this height in meters in your data table.
7 Repeat the same release height two more times and record your data.
8 Average the final heights.
9 Repeat steps #5-8 for four different initial release heights.

Disposal and Clean up

1 Take your track down and carefully remove tape from any surfaces.
2 Put all materials away where you found them.
3 When cutting the pipe you may have gotten small pieces of foam on the floor.
Sweep or vacuum the floor to clean this up.
4 If a recycling center in your area recycles Styrofoam, be sure to recycle the pipe
insulation.

Data

Draw a sketch of your roller coaster track. Use pie charts to show the relative energies
present at four different positions on your track. Remember, you are ignoring friction, so
assume all the energy in the pie chart is kinetic energy or potential energy.

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Fill in the data table below with your measurements of the marble’s initial and final
heights.

ℎ𝑖𝑛𝑖𝑡𝑖𝑎𝑙 (m) ℎ𝑓𝑖𝑛𝑎𝑙1 (m) ℎ𝑓𝑖𝑛𝑎𝑙2 (m) ℎ𝑓𝑖𝑛𝑎𝑙3 (m) ℎ𝑓𝑖𝑛𝑎𝑙𝑎𝑣𝑔 (m)

0.3175 0.1964 0.1872 0.189 0.1909

0.362 0.1968 0.1905 0.1873 0.1915

0.235 0.1635 0.1633 0.1524 0.1597

0.1497 0.1461 0.1445 0.1349 0.1418

Analysis

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Create a graph using the following information to guide you.
1 The initial height should be on the x-axis, and the average final height should be on
the y-axis. Be sure to label both axes with variable name and units.
2 Graph your data points and create a best-fit line. A best-fit line is drawn to express
the trend of the data; therefore, it may or may not actually pass through your actual
plotted data points. Instead, the idea is to draw a line that passes through as many
plotted points as possible with an equal number of points lying on either side of the
line for the ones that did not hit the line directly. Many graphing programs will
construct this line for you, calling it a “linear regression.”
3 Remember to title your graph something that clearly expresses what variables you
tested.
The graph may be drawn on the grid below. If you prefer, you may use your own graph
paper or Excel.

Next, analyze the graph to determine the relationship between the variables.
1 What is the relationship between the variables as shown in the graph? Hint: When
the x-variable increases, the y-variable does what?

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 When the initial height increases, the average final height increases.

2 What is the equation of the line? Do not use x and y. Use variables that express the
actual things that you measured. For example, if you were measuring the mass, you
might use the variable m. Include numbers and units where needed. Assume the y-
intercept is close enough to 0 to leave it out of the equation.

haverage = 0.244(hinitial)

3 How does the slope of the graph explain the relationship between the variables?
Hint: When the x-variable increases by how much, the y-variable does what by how
much?

When the initial height increases by one meter, the average final height
increases by 0.244 meters

4 Assume that the mass of the marble is 5 grams (based on the average mass of a
common marble). Calculate the initial potential energy of your marble for one of
your trials.

PE = mgh
PE = 5(9.8)(0.362) = 17.738 J

5 Calculate the final potential energy of your marble for the same trial based on the
average final height.

PE = 5(9.8)(0.1915) = 9.3835 J

6 Think about this graph in terms of conservation of energy. You know that the work
done on the system equals the change of energy of the system.
W = ∆E
or W = Efinal – Einitial
What type of energy does the marble have at the initial point of your experiment?
At the final point? Are those two energies equal in amount? Why or why not?

At the initial point of the experiment, the marble has potential energy, as well as at
the final point of the experiment. These two energies are not equal in amount
because the marble has already converted some of the potential energy to kinetic
energy through falling. Also, the marble continues to move past the final point in

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 the experiment, thus converting the rest of the potential energy to kinetic energy.

7 The equation of your graph is (example slope shown, yours will likely vary):
hf = 0.6 hi
If you multiply both sides by mg, you will get
mghf = 0.6 mghi
What does the mgh stand for? If there were no work done by friction and the
marble reached the same height on the other side, what would this new equation
look like?

The mgh represents potential energy. If there was no work done by friction and the
height was the same on both sides , then the new equation would look like hmgh=hmgh.
8. We do know that there was work done by friction in this lab. You can rewrite the
example equation as:

mghf = 0.6 mghi 1 – 0.4 = 0.6 so this can be rewritten as

mghf = (1 – 0.4) mghi
mghf = mghi - 0.4 mghi
0.4 mghi = mghf - mghi
W = mghf - mghi
Based on the equation of your graph, what percentage of the initial potential
energy was “lost” to friction during the marble’s run? (Hint: Refer to the slope of
you line of best fit.)

1 – 0.244 = 0.756
0.756 x 100 = 75.6 % of potential energy was lost

Conclusion

After conducting the experiment, how would you now explain the problem(s) or answer
the question(s)? Were you able to support your hypothesis or not? Be sure to base your
answer on the data you collected. Consider whether your conclusion is the only
explanation for the data you collected or if there could be alternate explanations.
Use these prompts to guide you in writing your conclusion.
 Briefly describe how you conducted the experiment.
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  What is the relationship between the initial height and the final height for your
marble?
 What does the slope of your graph represent?
 Why does it make sense that the graph passes through (0, 0)?
 What is the general equation that can be used for the conservation of energy
and work in a system?
 What percentage of energy in your experiment was made unusable due to the
work done by friction? How did that compare with your prediction? Were you
surprised at the result?
 What sources of measurement error were there in your experiment? Is there
anything you could do differently next time to minimize this measurement
error?

I took a 6-foot-long foam pipe and cut a piece of it off lengthwise so there was
room to see inside the pipe. I then cut the pipe in half and used one half to make
my own rollercoaster. I folded the other half into a U shape and tied it to my
chair. I then picked an initial point and dropped the marble from said point onto
the track I had created. I put a piece of tape to mark the height the marble
reached on the other side of the track. I then repeated this another two times for
more trials. I repeated the whole marble dropping process four times from
different initial heights. My hypothesis was proven correct because as the initial
height increased, the average final height also increased. The slope of my graph
represents the amount of potential energy not lost due to friction. It makes sense
that the graph passes through (0,0) because if the marble is not dropped from an
initial height, then it will not have a final height or since the ball cannot drop from
a height of zero, the ball will not move and will remain in the same place of zero.
The conservation of energy equation is generally W = mghf – mghi. About 75.6%
of energy was made unusable by friction, which was much more than I predicted.
It was very difficult to measure the final height of the marble. Next time I would
keep the track touching the ground, so it was easier to measure.

Additional Questions

1 Choose a height in between the initial and final heights on your track. For this
example even though unrealistic, assume there is no work done by friction. Use
conservation of energy principles to calculate the speed of the marble at your
chosen height.

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 H = 0.2
Ei = mgh
Ef = ½ mv2
Mgh = ½ mv2
Gh = ½ v2
2gh = v2
V = √(2gh)
V = √(2x9.8x0.2)
V = 1.98 m/s

2 Suppose you conducted this experiment in a different setting with slightly different
materials and the slope of the graph came out to be 0.8. What does this tell you
about the energy transfers in the system as compared with your experiment?

There was less potential energy lost due to friction in that experiment compared to
my experiment.

3 If your experiment does not seem to match the expected results, what did you learn
from the experience? If you were to repeat the lab so that the results were closer to
what was expected, what would you do differently?

I would put the tube on the ground.

Proof:

2b8a3376-6f7b-40e9-84c7-f365bde6b2b4

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