Science : Forces & Motion - Speeding Past School

Speeding Past School Experiment 

Instructions: As a group, decide how you are doing to carry out this investigation. Then present your idea to your teacher. Once your teacher has approved your method, carry out your investigation. You will need to write up your report so it is able to be presented to the principal. 

Aim: Investigate if people speed past the school or if people drive more than 50 kilometres per hour. 

Method: 

1. Measure the distance of Power Pole to Power Pole = 50 m

2. Time how long it takes a car to travel this distance.

3. Collect 10 times.

4. Calculate speed in m/s and then covert it to km/hr.

5 Are there any speeders?

Roles: 

- "Flag" is the person that indicates when the car passes their pole.

- "Timer" is the person starts when the car stops and when the car passes their pole.

- "Writer" is the person who is writing down the time.

Result:

Speed: 

Car 1 - Time(s): 4.69 m s-1: 10.6 km/hr-1: 38.16

Car 2 - Time(s): 3.59 m s-1: 13.9 km/hr-1: 50.04

Car 3 - Time(s): 4.50 m s-1: 11.1 km/hr-1: 39.9

Car 4 - Time(s): 4.40 m s-1: 11.3 km/hr-1: 40.18

Car 5 - Time(s): 5.40 m s-1: 9.25 km/hr-1: 33.3

Car 6 - Time(s): 4.13 m s-1: 12.10 km/hr-1: 43.2

Car 7 - Time(s): 6.07 m s-1: 8.21 km/hr-1: 29.5

Car 8 - Time(s): 3.17 m s-1: 13.2 km/hr-1: 47.5

Car 9 - Time(s): 3.43 m s-1: 14.5 km/hr-1: 52.2

Car 10 - Time(s): 5.02 m s-1: 9.96 km/hr-1: 35.8

Time: Average - 4.504

m s-1: Average - 11.402

km/hr-1: Average - 46.01

Conclusion: The result are all different, some are in the line of 30 up to 50, some of those cars do go past the speed limit of 50 km/hr but only for a few seconds. My own hypothesis for the time was going to be around 4 seconds because a few of the results are around 4 seconds or more, the result of the average time was close to my hypothesis. Though, I did not expect that the average speed was 11, I thought it would be more than 11, like maybe 12 or 13. For the average speed per hour, It was a bit difficult for me to make hypothesis because the numbers are far apart from each other but I guess 46 km/hr is fair.