Helpmyphysics

An important skill in physics is to rearrange formulas. Click the picture to watch the lesson movie.

The period of a satellite is the time it takes for one complete orbit.

Click the picture to see two satellites orbiting the Earth. Which one has the biggest period.
Determine the periods of each satellite.

For Higher Physics students:

• Determine the period and frequency of the ac supply
• Find the rms voltage of the ac signal

It is impossible to measure the speed of an object at an instant.
It is only possible to find the object’s speed over a small distance and time.
This is achieved using a light gate and a thin card of length say 10 cm.
When the card interrupts the light beam it turns off a light sensor and starts an electronic timer.
The timer stops when the card passes the light beam and the sensor picks up the light signal again.

The near instantaneous speed is calculated by:

Use this sim to find out about the resistance of combined resistors.

Click the above picture for information on how astronomers detect exoplanets.
Exoplanets are planets orbiting a star outside our solar system.

Click the picture to work out the speed of sound in water and glass.

How do the speeds compare to the speed of sound in air?

Click on the picture to help fill in your summary sheet on voltage divider sensors.

A capacitor can be used in a sensor circuit to switch on a transistor after a time interval.
Such a voltage divider circuit will act as a kind of timer.
The time the voltage across the capacitor reaches 0.7 v, to switch on the transistor, can be short or long depending on the size of the capacitance of the capacitor or the size of the resistor its being charged through.

To lengthen the time interval the resistance can be made bigger or the vakue of the capacitor’s capacitance can be made bigger.