The main attraction of copper pans is their appearance and the fact that copper is a good conductor of heat. The disadvantages are that they are more difficult to clean and they are more expensive than most other materials.
This will be shown through the different time each material takes for the pins to eventually fall off when the Vaseline melts, which will show if the material is a good conductor of heat.
Explanation
I have chosen Iron to be the best material to make the base of the pan from this is because the atoms in a solid vibrate in their positions, as the atoms vibrate within each other there are some materials better than others e.g. metals vibrate more than non-metals. “The atoms in a metal have some electrons that can move about anywhere in a piece of metal”. The collisions are exchanged into energy. This is shown as the average kinetic energy which does not change, for example if one region consists of a higher temperature than another region, then the atoms in the high temperature region looses energy in the collisions. The atoms in the low temperature region will gain energy. This is one way that the heat flows through a solid by conduction.
“Conduction-energy is transferred through a substance, usually a solid, but the substance itself does not move”
I got this information from a book called ‘physics’
This diagram is showing that the atoms in metals have electron. This was also taken from the book ‘physics’
Things I will keep the same
The things I will need to keep the same to make this experiment a fair test are; temperature if the flame from the Bunsen burner, temperature of the room, the amount of Vaseline used and the distance of the flame from the material.
The things I am going to change
The 1 thing that I am going to change is the type of materials that are going to be used
Method
- Make sure that the pins are placed 5cm apart, and the amount of Vaseline used is approximately the same for each process that has taken place.
- Start the stop clock at the same instant as you immerse each bar.
- Record the time present by the stop clocking using the table to show the time which is taken for each sector of the pins to drop from the different bars.
- In order to have an accurate measurement repeat the process of which the tasks have been taken and record the averages of the two or more sets of results.
Safety precautions
- Keep hands away from the metals
- Make sure the safety flame is on when its not under the materials
- Make sure all hair is tied back.
Results
Results of the experiment “which material would be the best for making the base of a pan”
Analysis
Doing thorough research and doing a thorough observation via an experiment I found that copper was the best conductor from the five materials (Brass, Aluminium, Glass, Copper and Iron) that were used to test the most common conductor of heat which showed that copper was the most preferred and useful heat conductor.
From my experimental results I gathered information through table and graphs as well as my own knowledge that show that copper is the best material for conducting heat, on the other hand glass is the best insulator as it broke before all the pins had dropped off, this shows that it will not maintain the pressure of heat which is pushed towards the surface of the glass.
Conclusion
All metals conduct heat differently, for example brass has the odd result, as this could mean that I repeated this experiment twice so my results for this might not have been accurate.
Copper is the best conductor, but doing thorough research I found that copper leaves stains which make iron more preferable.
Evaluation
Through the progression of my experiment I found that each step was easy and time consuming as it provided accurate result, this is as the experiment was done in two sectors which gave accurate result to have precise average for each material.
The graph show it took longer as the heat progressed toward the end of the bar; this is shown as the pattern changes on the graph.
I think my experiment was a fair test because I repeated my experiment 3 times which gave me the averages of each result.
To improve this some process should have taken place to measure the right amount of Vaseline in order to make it an accurate and fair experiment. An automatic stop clock should have been attached to the bar to form a consistent and accurate reading.
