An investigation to investigate if current through an electromagnet effects the magnetic force?

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An investigation to investigate if current through an electromagnet effects the magnetic force?

What is an electromagnet?

An electromagnet is simply a coil of wire.  It is usually wound around an iron core.  However, it could be wound around an air core, in which case it is called a solenoid.  When connected to a DC voltage or current source, the electromagnet becomes energized, creating a magnetic field just like a permanent magnet.   The magnetic flux density is proportional to the magnitude of the current flowing in the wire of the electromagnet.  The polarity of the electromagnet is determined by the direction the current. 

 

Background Knowledge

 

 

Electromagnet is often a piece of metal in a coil of wire.  When the wire has no current flowing through, the magnet is just a regular piece of metal that possesses no magnetic ability.  However when the current is passed through, the metal becomes magnetized.  This is because the wire is magnetized; thus the metal adjacent to it becomes magnetized also. 

 

 

As the wire has no obvious poles for being a magnet, the direction of the field is determined by  ‘Right Hand Rule’ that determines the direction of the field by looking at the direction of the current.  If the current is flowing vertically upwards, the field is anti-clockwise, and thus if the current is flowing downwards, the field id going clockwise. If one closes his right hand, the thumb is the direction of the current, and the fingers indicate the direction of the field, going around in a circle. This magnetic field magnetizes the metal and the metal becomes a magnet. This starts off with electricity, therefore magnet is called electromagnet.

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Uses of electromagnets

 

·        Electric bells

 

·        Telephones

 

·        Sorting scrap metals (to extract iron, steel, nickel from others metals and non-metals) 

Planning Experimental procedures


The quantity that I am intending to investigate in my experiment is the
strength of the electromagnet
The factors that affect the strength of an electromagnet are: The
temperature, current, length of the core, diameter, the thickness of the
wire used for the coils, how tightly the coils of wire are wrapped around,
the material and also the number of turns on the electromagnet.
I am only going to vary current ...

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