January 2015 Semester

REVISION FOR TEST 1

1.

A spherical tank to hold water for a small village in a developing country

is

shown in FIGURE Q1.

FIGURE Q1
The volume of liquid it can hold can be computed as

V h 2

3R h
3

where V volume [m3],

h depth of water in tank [m], and

R the tank

radius [m].

If R 3 m, determine the depth of the tank to be filled so that it holds

30 m3 using three iterations of
a.

the false-position method. Find the approximate percent relative

error after the first iteration. Note that an initial guess of R

will

always converge.
[10 marks]
b.

the Newton-Raphson method. Find the approximate percent relative

error for each iteration. Note that an initial guess of R will always
converge.
[10 marks]

January 2015 Semester

2.

a.

A spherical storage tank shown in FIGURE Q2 containing oil

has radius of 10 cm.

FIGURE Q2
The volume of oil that the spherical tank can hold can be computed
as

V rh 2 h 3
3

where V is the volume, r is the radius and h is the height of wet

portion of the dipstick. Use four iterations of the bisection method to
determine h

when the tank contains 1000 cm3 volume of oil.

Compute the approximate percent relative error, a , after the first

iteration. Note that an initial guess of r will always converge.
[10 marks]
b.

The following equation pertains to the concentration of a chemical in a

completely mixed reactor:
C C in (1 e 0.05 t ) C 0 e 0.05 t .

If the initial concentration C 0 5

and the inflow concentration

C in 12 , compute the time (t ) required

for C to be equal to 10

using Newton-Raphson method with an initial guess of t 0 0 and

iterate until a 0.01% .
[10 marks]

January 2015 Semester

3. a. Given the system of linear equations

3 x1 x 2 x3 5
x1 4 x 2 2 x3 8
2 x1 x 2 4 x3 5.5
i.

Derive an LU decomposition for the coefficient matrix [ A] .

[4 marks]

ii.

Find the values of x1 , x 2

and x3

using [L]

and [U ]

matrices obtained in part (a)(i).

[3 marks]
iii.

Solve the given linear system for an alternative right-hand

6.5
side vector [B ] 7.5 .
8
[3 marks]

4.

In a chemical engineering process, water vapour (H 2O)

is heated to

sufficiently high temperatures that a significant portion of the water

dissociates, or splits apart, to form oxygen (O 2 ) and hydrogen (H 2 ) :

H 2O

H 2 + O2 .
2

If it is assumed that this is the only reaction involved, the mole fraction x
of H 2O that dissociates can be represented by

x
2 pt
,
1 x 2 x

where K = the reaction equilibrium constant and pt = the total pressure

of the mixture. If pt 3.5 atm and K 0.04 , determine the value of x
that satisfies the above equation using three iterations of
a.

bisection method with the initial guesses

xl 0.01 and xu 0.03 .

January 2015 Semester

Compute the approximate percent relative error, a , after the first

iteration.
[10 marks]
b.

modified secant method with the initial guess x0 0.01 and the
perturbation fraction, 0.01 . Compute the approximate percent
relative error, a , after each iteration.
[10 marks]

5.

An oscillating current in an electric circuit is described by

i 7 e t sin t 2
where i

is the current in amperes and t

is the time in seconds.

Determine the value of t such that i 3 using four iterations of

a.

the bisection method with initial guesses of t l 0

and t u 0.5 .

Find the approximate percent relative error after the first iteration.
[10 marks]
b.

the Newton-Raphson method with an initial guess of t 0 0.3 . Find

the approximate percent relative error for each iteration.
[10 marks]

January 2015 Semester

6.

a. The following system of equations is designed to

determine concentrations (the c s in g/m3) in a series of coupled
reactors as a function of the amount of mass input to each reactor (the
right- hand sides in g/day),

15c1 3c 2 c3 3300
3c1 18c 2 6c3 1200
4c1 c 2 12c3 2400
Determine the concentrations using the

LU

decomposition

method.
[10 marks]