PHY215

Experiment for the Law of

Conservation of Energy

Objective: To study the law of conservation of energy as it is

applied to a free body diagram.
Theory:
When it is said that something is conserved, it is meant that
the quantity is a constant and does not change with time. It is a
somewhat surprising aspect of nature that when a body is in
motion, its position is changing with time,, its velocity is changing
with time, yet certain characteristics of that motion still remain
constant. One if these quantities served leads us to the law of
conservation of energy. In any closed system the total energy of
the system remains a constant. This is the law of conservation of
energy. There may be a transfer of energy from on form to
another, but the total energy remands the same. Observing a
body in free fall the body starts from restate the top, its velocity
zero, and thus its kinetic energy is zero. The total energy of the
body at the top is therefore all potential energy. Hence we use the
formula
E0=P E0 =mg h0

For the purpose of this experiment we want to plot the potential

energy, kinetic energy, and the total energy of the falling photo
gate as a function of height. In order to do so we must use the
following equations including the one up above. The total energy
at a point
Etotal=PE+ KE

So,
1
Etotal=mgh+ m v 2
2

Etotal=E 0=E f

Or

This would tell you,

1
Efinal =K E f = m v2f
2

Doing so will give us a graphical representation of all the energy

in terms of height.
Procedure: Items Used: meter stick, scale, photo gate, data
studio, Excel, Multiple picket fences taped together.
I.
II.
III.

First get your items set up properly

Tape your photo gates together
Connect your computer to data studio

IV.

Take a few practice runs of dropping your picket fences

through the photo gate

V.
Record your data and put it into Excel
VI. Measure the picket fence this is your starting height.
VII. Each point of the fence is 5cm apart so subtract 5 from
the total height until it hits zero or very close to it.
VIII. Calculate Potential, Kinetic, and Total energy at each
point.

Data:
For the particular experiment the mass of the picket fence
was 129.20g the initial height was 71cm and the final height was
of course zero.

For example of initial energy:

E0=P E0 =mg h0

.129 kg 9.81

m
.71 m=.90 J
s2

For example of final energy:

1
Efinal =K E f = m v2f
2

1
m
.129 kg 3.73 =.90 J
2
s

Conclusion:
It is known that the final energy is equal to the initial energy.
From what is shown. The data gathered in this experiment was
used to calculate the kinetic, potential, and total energy at each
data point on the picket fence. The values that were calculated for
each energy at each data point support the theory that total
energy is equal to initial and final energy this can be shown
because the initial energy was .90 J

the final energy was .90 J

and the average total energy was .88 J . There is only 2.2% error
between the two. There could have been possible errors in the
data which might have been caused by the fence being drop
improperly. There could also be a chance that the picket fence hit

something while it was in free fall which would cause incomplete

data.