Phy121 Lab 6 Atwood's Machine Experiment

To investigate Newton's laws using the Atwood's machine, two very light, low moment of inertia pulleys will be used with a photogate. The ten spokes of the pulley wheels will turn on and off the photogate which will then be plotted as speed versus time. The slope on the graph will produce the acceleration for each trial. The PASCO 850 UI and the Capstone software will be used to collect and analyze this data. There will be two experiments. The first will keep the net force constant (a difference in weight of about 25.0 g (0.245 N) is good) and the mass will be varied by adding equal amounts to both sides. For the 2nd experiment, the total mass will be kept constant (around 300 g is good) and the force varied. This require mass from one side to be moved to the other side. This one's a little trickier!!