Question

When a 77 g piece of metal with a temperature of 88 Degree Celsius is placed into 277 g of water having a temperature of 20 degree Celsius, the final temperature of the metal and water is 23.3 degree Celsius. What must be the specific heat of the metal?

Answer 1

heat lost by metal + heat gained by water = 0
[mass metal x specific heat metal x (Tfinal-Tinitial)] + [mass H2O x specific heat H2O x (Tfinal-Tinitial)] = 0
Substitute and solve for specific heat metal.

Answer 2

Thank you bob. However, what is specific heat of a metal is e metal is unknown.

Answer 3

The problem asks for the specific heat of the metal. That's what you're solving for. Substitute the numbers and solve for specific heat.
[77 x sp.h.metal x (23.3-20.0)] + [277 x 4.184 x (23.3-20.0)] = 0
You have only one unknown; i.e., specific heat metal. Solve for that.