The Experiment of Heat Loss Plus Heat Gain of a Given Substance and the Phenomenon of Specific Heat - Lab Report Example

Purpose: In the laboratory, the experiment did use heat loss plus heat gain of a given substance and also the given phenomenon of specific heat. It went further to compute specific heat from other substances and then compared it to actual values.
Apparatus: In the experiment, the following apparatus got used: Calorimeter; stirring rod; thermometer; hotplate; safe weights; metal blocks (Iron and aluminum), strong twine, and a holding rod.
Procedure: A mass of a given metal block got weighed than a piece of twine 30 cm long became attached to it. Then the block became lowered into a steam boiler. The boiler then had half-filled water.  As the water got heated to boil, the mass of an empty calorimeter got measured. The calorimeter got filled two-thirds with water that was several degrees colder compared to room temperature. Then the mass of both the water and the calorimeter became measured. In the experiment, an outer cap became placed around the calorimeter to prevent heat loss from it when it becomes warmer than room temperature.

In the experiment, the two metals used became copper and Iron. The mass of copper and iron became 269.53g and 230.80g respectively upon weighing. The mass of the calorimeter used became 46.13g. The mass of the calorimeter added to water for Iron was slightly more than that of copper. In starting with the original temperature for the calorimeter plus water at 21.9 degrees, in dipping the blocks of metal, the final temperature dipped with copper became 30.4 degrees while iron became 30.1 degrees. In calculating the specific heat of the solid for the two experiments, an error of 0.

006cal/g-degrees became found for copper while an error of 0.003cal/g-degrees became recorded for Iron. Therefore, iron recorded a percentage error of 2.86% from the accepted value while copper recorded a percentage error of 6.45%.