If a hot piece of metal (at 80 degrees Celsius) is placed in cold water (10 degrees Celsius), what can you say about the final temperature of the water/metal mixture? If you wanted a more accurate answer, what other information would you need?

Question

If a hot piece of metal (at 80 degrees Celsius) is placed in cold water (10 degrees Celsius), what can you say about the final temperature of the water/metal mixture?  If you wanted a more accurate answer, what other information would you need?

DrBob222 · Answer

I'm sure you know what will happen so I'll leave the first part to you. To be more quantitative, you need the following:
q(heat lost by metal) = mass metal x specific heat metal x (Tfinal-Tinitial).
q(heat gained by water) = mass H2O x specific heat water x (Tfinal-Tinitial).
You can go through the two equations and count up what other information you would need.

jean luc · Answer

Oooooooooooh....thanks Dr. Bob cannot believe I missed that