Lab 2 Acceleration of Gravity 08-28-12

The lab is found here
http://www.hartnell.edu/physics/labs/4a/2accelerationofgravityrubberballv2.pdf

#4 Why should the graph of position over time be a porabola for a ball tossed up and allowed to fall?
An observer of the ball would notice how smothly the ball transitions from movement to stop to movement in the oposite direction. A porabola decribes the motion of the ball over time. first moving (up) rapidly, slowing down, freezing (stopping), then slowly (falling down) finally picking up speed (falling) before reaching it original position. A porabola is merily the mathmatical way of descibing the balls motion.

#5 Table computed using experimented measurements and percent error equation
percent error=((measured-actual)/actual)*100%
actual for this experiment was 9.80m/s^2

Results from Falling Body Experiments
Trial	gexp (2A) (m/s2)	% Difference	gexp (m) (m/s2)	% Difference
1	-9.7	1.0	-9.9	1.0
2	-9.6	2.0	-10.1	3.0
3	-9.5	3.0	-9.9	1.0
4	-9.4	4.0	-9.0	8.0
5	-9.7	1.0	-9.6	2.0

There was some confusion as to significant figures steming from not reading the instuctions acurately enough leading to assuming that gravity was 9.8m/s^2; that is the reason for only 2 decimal places in the answers.

#6

Above is the graphs of position vs. time and velocity vs. time
The velocity graph for all 5 cases where velocity is positive; the ball is moving up. Where velocity reaces the y axis (y=0) the ball has reached the maximum hight and stopped moving. When velocity is negative the ball is falling down. The curve or line rather is negatively sloped because during that time is is being acted upon by gravity in the oposite direction of being thrown up. Hence it is slowing down after being tossed up and speeding up as it falls This graph represents how gravity is affecting the velocity of the ball.

Conclusions:
For balls tossed up and allowed to fall back down the graph position vs. time will be a porabola, the graph velocity vs. time will be a sloped line in the negative direction.
Significant digits are significant.