Someone has to do it. There are laws in NZ pertaining to how the stated volume of bottled liquids corresponds to their actual volume. If, for example, you are selling beer in 375 ml capacity bottles, you need to make sure that your bottling plant is working to the NZ definition of what 375 ml […]
Continue readingTag: experiment
Plants in circular motion
In our first-year physics lab we have the following horticultural experiment. Here we have some bulbs growing on a rotating turntable. The array of five pots is placed on the turntable so that the centre pot is at the centre of the turntable; the left- and right-hand pots are at the perimeter.The turntable is rotating […]
Continue readingAxis labels – accurate but not at all obvious
I had a conversation with a class this morning regarding the labelling of axes on graphs.In particular, how we should indicate the units. Most quantities we deal with in physics carry units. A speed might be 35 km/h, a distance might be 16.8 mm, a pressure could be 28 kPa. Saying that a speed is […]
Continue readingHow to get entry into a physics degree (but not necessarily physics)
So, I'm now back from a lovely holiday in the UK, following a not-so-lovely period of being sick. Quite possibly I can also get back to blogging. Among the great many emails awaiting for me yesterday were a few about school physics and university physics. They were coming from different sources for different reasons, but […]
Continue readingA light puzzle
Here's a puzzling photograph that Hans Bachor showed me at the end of the NZ Institute of Physics conference last week. It comes from his public lecture on lasers a week ago. And we don't have the answer to it, so maybe you can enlighten us (pun intended). The photo is of a demonstration of […]
Continue readingNZIP2015 Highlights
So the NZ Institute of Physics conference is in full swing. I have a bit of a break between the end of the last session and tonight's conference dinner, so there's time to give some highlights so far. Well, first, the low-light: Like the rest of my family and half of Hamilton I've had a […]
Continue readingLenz’s law – at 3 tesla
When I was at school, and introduced to magnetic fields in a quantitative sense (that is, with a strength attached to it), I remember being told that the S.I. unit of magnetic flux density (B-field) is the tesla, and that 1 tesla is an extremely high B-field indeed. Ha! Not any more. Last Friday night […]
Continue readingA blatant plug for the NZIP2015 conference
There's no hiding my conflicts of interest here. I'm on the New Zealand Institute of Physics 2015 conference organizing committee. I'm also the NZIP treasurer. And I'm a staff member at the host organization. So, to contribute to the New Zealand physics community's biennial event in Hamilton on 6 – 8 July, click on this […]
Continue readingStatic friction is something sticky (as is Scholarship physics)
In January I had a go at the 2014 Scholarship Physics Exam, as I've done for the last couple of years. Sam Hight from the PhysicsLounge came along to help (or was it laugh?) The idea of this collaboration is that I get filmed attempting to do the Scholarship paper for the first time. This […]
Continue readingModes of a square plate
Alison has drawn my attention to this video. It demonstrates vibrational modes of a square plate by using sand. At certain frequencies, there are well defined modes of oscillation, in which parts of the plate 'nodal lines' are stationary. The sand will find its way to these parts and trace out some lovely pictures. Vibrational […]
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