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Essay about Physics Cantilever Lab

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Independent Assessment Physics Lab (SL): Cantilever Flexion
Cherno Okafor
Mr. Ebrahimi
SPH4U7
October 21st, 2012

Introduction

Purpose: The purpose of this Physics Lab is to investigate what factors determine the amount of flexion of the cantilever. Hence, the objective is to establish a relationship between the length of a cantilever, which may give some insight into the physics of cantilevers.

Hypothesis: If one increases the length of a cantilever, one would expect there to be an increase in deflection/flexion of the cantilever. Similarly, if one increases the mass of the load, one would expect there to be an increase in the deflexion/flexion of the cantilever. In addition, I predict that proportionality will also occur …show more content…

* Dependent Variable: The deflection/flexion of the cantilever in metres. This will be measured indirectly by measuring the initial height of the bottom of the cantilever with no mass added (which is equal to the height of the table) and the new height of the bottom of the cantilever after each trial, which will be measured with mass added. Hence, the difference between these heights is equal to the deflection/flexion of the cantilever. The material and other physical properties of the cantilever will be controlled by using the same yardstick as a cantilever for each trial.

Data Collection and Processing

My experiment is divided into two parts; experiment A (involving the relationship between flexion and the mass of the load) and experiment B (involving the relationship between the flexion and the length of the cantilever).
Below are two tables in which I have recorded the data which I obtained during the experiment. The first table reflects the Relationship between the deflection/flexion of the cantilever and the mass of the load and the second table reflects the relationship between the flexion of the cantilever and the length of the cantilever.

(i) Relationship between the deflection/flexion of the cantilever and the load mass (5 trials)

Table #1-Experiment A Factor/Variable | Trial 1 | Trial 2 | Trial 3 | Trial 4 | Trial 5 | Trial 6 | Trial 7 |

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