PhysicsCode 5054
Physical quantities and measurement techniques
What this topic asks you to be able to do
- outline the method for taking a range of length readings to a suitable precision with tapes, rulers and micrometers, including how to read the scale of an analogue micrometer
- describe the procedure for using a measuring cylinder to find a liquid's volume, and for finding a solid's volume through displacement
- outline the procedure for measuring an assortment of time intervals by means of clocks and digital timers
- Determine the average of a small distance, and of a short time interval, by measuring many of them together (including a pendulum's period of oscillation)
- Understand that a scalar quantity is described by its magnitude (size) only, but a vector quantity needs both magnitude and direction
- know that distance, speed, time, mass, energy and temperature are scalars
- Know that each of these is a vector quantity: displacement, force, weight, velocity, acceleration, momentum, electric field strength and gravitational field strength
- work out the resultant of a pair of vectors at right angles, by calculation or graphically