Question

In three to five sentences, explain how you would conduct an experiment to investigate the relationship between the applied force and the displacement of the spring, and describe its expected results.

Answer 1

Fix a vertical spring and hang known masses one at a time, allowing the spring to reach equilibrium after each addition; measure the displacement from the unstretched length with a ruler and calculate the applied force as the mass times g. Repeat for several masses, record F and x, and plot F versus x (or perform a linear fit). You should find a straight-line relationship F = kx whose slope gives the spring constant k and which passes near the origin. At large extensions the data may deviate from linearity due to the spring's elastic limit and experimental errors (parallax, damping, nonvertical alignment).