Aim: To determine the relationship between the drop angle of a bob and the time it takes for the pendulum to stop swinging. Focus Question: Can you make a Pendulum clock? A pendulum clock is a special type of old clock that was used before clocks were electronic. They work using a swinging pendulum that the user would wind up, and then the pendulum would swing. A pendulum continues to swing due to its continuous conversion between gravitational potential energy and kinetic energy. An object that continues to switch its energy between potential and kinetic is called a harmonic oscillator. Even though as the pendulum continues to swing, energy is lost to air resistance, the bob takes the exact same amount of time to complete one swing, no matter how much energy it has. This is simply because, with a higher angle comes a greater distance, but also a quicker swing time. As energy is lost and the angle becomes smaller, the pendulum also swings slower. This means that the period of the swing remains the same. The pendulum clock works around its swinging pendulum. Every time the bob completes a full swing, or returns to the point it was dropped from, it turns the second gear once, which turns the minute gear at 1/60 of the speed and therefore the hour hand at 1/60 the speed of the minute hand. We discovered that the oscillation of the pendulum, when dropped from an angle of 45 degrees, caused the pendulum to swing back and forth continuously for over 30 minutes. The fact that this single measurement took so long meant that we were unable to record any other angles. In our experiment we set up a pendulum using a bob on a 60cm string hanging from a clamp attached to a retort stand. The setup can be seen in the scientific diagram below.This is of Aiden's diagram not mine. Lesson Summary: Learn how a harmonic oscillator is an object that continuously transforms potential energy into kinetic energy and back again. Learnt how a pendulum clock works. Learnt about the period of a pendulum. The time it takes to return back to its point of origin and how each swing takes exactly the same amount of time.
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