The factors effecting Insulators Essays

The factors effecting Insulators Essays The factors effecting Insulators Essay The factors effecting Insulators Essay Essay Topic: Sula Introduction: I will be investigating the rate of cooing, by using various numbers of layers of insulators round a beaker of hot water. The science which effect my investigation are as follows:Conduction is a transfer of heat energy through a substance from the hotter region to the cooler region without any movement of the substance itself. As the substance is heated, free electrons spread through the substance bumping into other electrons and passing on Kinetic energy. Gradually energy is transferred along the substance. Radiation is the transfer of heat energy through waves. Hot objects emit mainly infrared radiation which can pass through a vacuum i.e. No medium is needed for its transfer. How much radiation is given out or taken in by an object depends on its surfaceIn this experiment I could have many variables. Ranging from colour to size. They are:- The material of my cup (ceramic, metal, glass, polythene, plastic)- The layers of insulators (no layers, 1layer, 2layer etc) [this is what I have chosen to use as my variable]- Different types of insulators (wool, bubble wrap, foam, cotton, paper)- Different colours of insulators. (Black, transparent,)Research and preliminary experiment:For when I did my Preliminary experiment I found out that writing down the results every Thirty Seconds was not sufficient. As the results did not have a good spread out drop. So we decided to change it to every Two Minutes.Also, the temperature of the water was at 85?c. But using that as the starting temperature we found that the water would not boil up to that temperature. And so we would have to re-heat the water to get it to the exact temperature we wanted. Which took up a lot of our time. So we decided to drop it by 5?c. So, in the real experiment we will have the water at 80?c.I think that in the end result the graph will look something like:Prediction:I predict that when I change the amount of layers of bubble-wrap around my beaker, the more laye rs there are the slower the rate of cooling will be. So, therefore the fewer numbers of layers I use the quicker the rate of cooling.This is what I think will happen. Because I am using bubble-wrap as my insulator the bubbles in the material have trapped air in them. So, when the high temperature from the water tries to escape the trapped air will act as a barrier and will hold in as much as possible. So, therefore the rate of cooling will be very less.I think this will happen because as the beaker is made of copper, which is a good conductor, the high temperature of the water will reduce rapidly.Diagram:Plan of ExperimentApparatus I will use in this experiment:- Electric water kettle- 125ml of hot water (at 80?c)- Measuring cylinder- Thermometer- Copper beaker- Insulator (bubble-wrap)- Stop-clockDiagram of my experiment set-up:Method:- Boil the water in an electric kettle.- Pour the water into a measuring cylinder. And measure until 125ml.- Put in a thermometer and measure at 80c.- Pour the water into a copper beaker (with our without insulator).- Put on the timer.- And note down the temperature every 2minutes. Until 10minutes.In this experiment I will be measuring the temperature drop every two minutes. I will do this by having a stop-clock to measure the temperature at exactly two minutes each time.I will carry out this experiment at least three times so that I can take an average, which will be more accurate and precise.Safety:In this experiment I will be handling hot water. So, I could have several different types of accidents. Like for example:- The hot water could spill on to someone which can lead to them burning themselves or even worse. So, I must make sure that when carrying out my experiment no one is sitting down on a chair. All chairs are tucked in. Bags are in the cupboards and there is nothing that anyone could trip over from.- When pouring the water out into the basin after conducting the experiment the beaker will be extremely hot! (Near boil ing point) So if I handle it by hand then I could burn myself, or I could drop the water causing the water to either spill onto someone, or it could spill onto the floor and someone could easily trip over it and hurt themselves.Variable Fair test:There will only be ONE thing that will change throughout the entire experiment. This will be the amount of layers around the beaker.I have to make sure nothing changes except my variable. So everything else has to be kept the same to make this a fair test. The things I will have to keep the same are:- The amount of water used- The temperature of water- The insulator material must always be Bubble-wrapResults:Result 1:LayersBegin at2min4min6min8min10min080c75c71c67c63c61c180c78c76c73c70c68c280c78c75c74c73c71c380c79c77c75c73c72c480c79c78c76c75c74cResults 2:LayersBegin at2min4min6min8min10min080c78c74c70c67c65c180c78c75c72c70c68c280c77c76c75c74c70c380c78c77c75c73c72c480c78c76c75c74c73cAverage results:LayersBegin at2min4min6min8min10min080c76. 5c72.5c68.5c65c63c180c78c75.5c72.5c70c68c280c77.5c76c74.5c73.5c70.5c380c78.5c77c75c73c72c480c78.5c77c75.5cc74.5c73.5cGraph:Gradients of the graph:0 layers -1.26984121 layer -1.17647052 layers -1.13475173 layers -1.11111114 layers -1.0884353The gradient is a Negative.I have also put my results onto a bar chart to help see clearly what is happening every two minutes. By looking at the bar chart you can easily see the difference in the rate of cooling. The non-layered beaker is dropping down at a faster rate, compared to the beaker with more layers, which is increasing at a quicker rate.Conclusion:The shape of the graph is a curve. The gradient goes downwards. As the amount of time (every 2 minutes) increases, the rate of cooling decreases. The gradient does not steep. What I mean by this is that as the amount of layers increases the temperature of hot water drops down gradually. This is the usual shape you get when things tend to cool down. The X axis is the Time every two minutes. Th e Y axis is the temperature in ?c. When things are hot they cool down very fast. But, the more insulators there is around the substance the longer it takes to cool down. Therefore, when I use four layers of bubble-wrap it will take longer to cool down. Whereas when I have no layers of bubble-wrap the quicker it cooled down.Looking back at my prediction I see that what I had predicted was exactly right. The beaker with no layers of insulation had dropped at a very rapid speed. Compared to the beaker with four layers of insulation. Which dropped at a slower speed. The principle was exactly the same.The beaker that had no layers on insulation would take in the high temperature, and because the beaker was made of metal it was a good conductor of heat energy so the heat would escape very quickly. Whereas the beaker with lots of layers would help keep the high temperature within itself. And stop it from escaping. This is because of the type of insulation we used. The bubble warp has air b ubbles inside itself. This helps to keep the heat inside as much as possible.Evaluation:My experiment did not go as I had planned. My graph tells me that some of my results were fairly accurate. But a few of my results were anomalous results. I can tell this from my graph by looking at the bar chart, where it is much clearer to see the difference in temperature every two minutes. If you look closely at the bar chart you will notice that at two minutes the temperature of the one layer was slightly above the beaker with two layers. This cannot be right because the beaker with 1 layer should drop down in temperature quicker then the beaker with 2 layers. Because the beaker with 2 layers has more insulation around it. This could be because we didnt take down the results properly or my average wasnt right. I tried to make my results accurate by making sure everything that I do was a fair test. We came across some difficulties whilst conducting this experiment. Like for instance, we were supposed to take out three results and then take out an average. But because time was of an essence we could only take out the experiment twice. So, our average isnt as precise as it should be.I could improve my investigation by, like I said before conducting my experiment three times at least, so that I can take out a reliable average. Also this would help us to draw out accurate conclusions. If we had shared results with other groups this would of helped us to see if we went wrong anywhere or if they went wrong anywhere. So we could fix the problem.My method was good. It was quick, simple and easy to follow by. Especially once we got use to how to do it.I think that my conclusion is very accurate. I drew my conclusion out of previous knowledge, textbooks, class notes and by doing this investigation. I had enough evidence to help draw up this conclusion. To help get even more evidence for my conclusion I could do another type of investigation similar to this.