Electric Potential Lab Activity

This is the worksheet for the Electric Potential Lab/Activity

I dont think much explanation is needed for any of this as I just completed the work required.

The pictures say more than a 1000 words, and the pictures have words in them as well, so thats at least 1200 words!!

Lab 19

This is what a magnetic field sensor looks like. On the other side is a white dot, which is the only area where it detects magnetic waves. It has a bit of a light tower design. This is important to know, because the data can come out extremely wrong if the device is not used correctly.

The reaction of the sensor to the magnetic field of the earth, using three axis to rotate around. two were cosine waves where only one was a sine.

In this experiment we use the magnetic field sensor, clamp it down and use a plastic tube and electric wiring to wrap around it. We want to see the effects of the electric field as we increase the number of loops going around the sensor.

The data collected. Im not sure why our amps were so low, but our data was pretty consistent. All the data seemed to be off by a factor of 10 compared to other groups and Masons data. 

Once we got past loop 4, the data would strangely fluctuate. I dont know why.

Here are professor masons results, showing an increase of the magnetic field as the loops increase. very straight forward.

Comparing our data to the professors, we can see that our data is pretty consistent, but yet again off by a factor of 10, because our current was lower. We tried everything to get it up, but then figured it acts the same even with a lower current.

Some beautiful calculations of the ratio (B/NI) and we related that to the length of the wire.

Here we have an experiment using solenoids. On to you can see the 3 factors that determine how to get a high current.

This final experiment uses on large solenoid and a smaller one hovering above it. We supply a AC current to simulate the movement of the magnet going through the solenoid. Motion is required to generate a current using magnetism. But the efficiency is the main problem. We were pumping in over 10 Amps just to light up a tiny led light. The higher the current the further away the top solenoid could be to see the light light up.

Observe the amazement in my eyes.. O.O

Lab 17

Here we have a magnetic motor. It will rotates either clockwise or counterclockwise depending on what way the current is flowing.

Unfortunately I was not present for this experiment (although i would have loved to..)

I talked to Nate and got the grasp of what is happening.

There is a spooled up wire, connected to a current siting above a magnet. The magnet will twist the spool half way, but then stop, because of the insulating material. It will rotate continuously if half the side of the spool is shaved off, giving it enough momentum to make a whole rotation and have the magnet twist it again. 

This experiment related the magnetic field due to current. We have 3 points of interest. Point 1 show 2 currents flowing in opposite directions. Point 2 shows 2 currents flowing in the same direction and Point 3 has just one current. The direction of the magnetic field was determined by a compass. For the two currents in opposite directions the compass pointed north meaning no deflection. One current was deflected to the right ,as well as the two currents going in the same direction deflected also to the right.

Lab 18

Calculating the Earths magnetic field

We used this apparatus, which is essentially a would up spool of electric wire. On the center we located a compass in the center. All connected to an Ammeter. What it does as we run the current through the wire, it will deflect the compass needle to the right (the higher the current the more to the right it will go). The needle will never be perpendicular to its initial direction, because the magnetic field of the earth will always be pulling on the needle.

This particular spool had 30 revolutions of the wire.

We took 5 different currents and measured the angle it moved. We calculated the magnetic field of the coil and plotted the data as seen above. It is relatively linear. Using the formula [Bcoil=Bearth*tan(theta)) we were able to calculate the earths magnetic field. 

Lab 16

Exploring Magnetism

Drawing arrows around the bar magnet, indicating where the N pointer of the compass points. We can observe the arrows pointing away on one side and towards the magnet on the other.

Here is very cool look at metal shavings, and how they react to the compass. They are pretty much a million little compasses, indicating the flow of the magnetic field.

After updating the magnetic field lines of the bar magnet to a more accurate model, we measured flux on 3 different spots. Flux around the South Pole, Flux around the North Pole, and Flux somewhere in space, not containing any pole.
We witness that the flux anywhere outside the poles was zero.

How a magnet alters the behavior of a charged electrons flight path.

Electricity and Magnetism

we are going to calculate the magnitude of the magnetic field generated by the magnet, using current running through a copper pipe, and how long it takes for the pipe to move a certain distance.

Calculations using the given variables to calculate the magnitude of the magnets magnetic field

Lab 15

Oscilloscope, an engineer's best friend

a simulation of what is happening inside an oscilloscope

The device

This function generator reminds me of my MOOG synthesizer! except is much more primitive and obviously not designed as a musical instrument.

Using this battery connected to this switch, we wanted to measure the results on the Oscilloscope.

The signal as it it not connected. Same as the ground.

with the switch engaged we can observed what kind of Voltage output the battery has. From the looks of it, it is around 1.2V.

Because we were extremely experimental and did not trust the initial value, we wanted to get a more precise reading. We switched the increments to .2V per Bar

Looking at the graph, we can see that the output voltage is 1.24V.

We were feeling satisfied.

Running the Function Generator into the Oscilloscope. Using a sine wave. As you can see in the picture the data is junk, because our "var sweep" knob is fully engaged, totally altering the input signal.. smh

Using a square wave into the not calibrated device. Because this was solely for observational purposes, the lack of calibration did not haunt us, and we quickly fixed it after.

Testing a phone charger:

I dont have a picture of the charger we tested, but it was the highly sought after name brand "Buddy"...

Here we can see the amount of noise of the AC signal coming from it. Pretty decent

Checking the DC signal on the other hand gave a terrible signal. Compared to the high quality DC power supplies we have in class (which put out a straight line 

Things got really interesting once we introduced this second function generator into the mix.

We were able to get really interesting results, where one FG was assigned to the x-axis, and the other to the y-axis. 

Got carried away

If we put both Generators to the same frequency we were able to get a nice circle with minimal motion.

Mystery Box Experiment:

We were able to get an AC signal with the red and black connection

A similar signal was archived using the green and black. We are pretty sure that there is a square wave inside the mystery box, although the ends of the squares are pretty curved. Jason was suggesting that that is because the device is not calibrated. I'm not quite sure. It could be because there is some blend between a square and sine wave maybe.

A strange slope appeared

Alright, this thing is truly a mystery box. What we know for sure is that there are only AC current coming from it.

A little description of what we observed and the frequency and amplitude of each setting.