INTERPRETATION

Friction is very important in many aspects of everyday life. Any body that moves, in one
way or another, experiences an opposing force either from air or from body in contact. This force
is called friction which opposes and tends to retard the motion of the body.

Friction force is denoted by f. Its direction is always opposing to the relative motion of
two surfaces. On a certain body, not only the friction force is present. Normal force,
perpendicular component vector, is always present on a body and denoted by N. It is directly
proportional to the frictional force and can be mathematically expressed as

or f = kN

where f is the friction force and N as the normal force acting on the body. Coefficient of friction (
) takes place the k which is constant of proportionality. Thus, giving us the equation

f = N.

Going back to the experiment, it was divided into three main parts namely, determining
the coefficient of friction on part 1, angle of repose on part 2, and maximum force that causes
uniform motion in part 3.

On the first part, we placed the wooden block on a wooden plane horizontal to the ground
and tied it to a pan passing to a frictionless pulley. (Note: surface is frictionless if the effect of
friction is negligibly small.) In the first trial, we considered the wooden block alone for the Wb
and adjusted the weights on the pan to observe uniform motion on the wooden block. In the rest
of the trials, we adjusted the weights placed on top of the block and on the pan and has been
recorded under Wb and Wp respectively, taking note on the uniform motion on the wooden
block. Under this part, we were asked to place narrow side of the block on the first two trials and
the wide side on the rest. We gathered the data below:

Coefficient
Trial (W block + Weight added) Wb (W pan + Weight added) Wp
of friction,
1 262.7 g 81.8 g 0.31
2 282.7 g 101.8 g 0.36
3 362.7 g 171.8 g 0.47
4 502.7 g 221.8 g 0.44
5 592.7 g 241.8 g 0.41
Average coefficient of friction, 0.40
Table 1. Determination of the Coefficient of Friction
 Through these data, even though we had minimal errors on having closer values to the
accepted values for coefficient of friction, we have proven that coefficient of friction is
independent on the area of contact.

On the second part of this experiment, we were asked to determine the angle of repose,
also known as limiting angle. If the body slides down the incline due to its own height, angle
between the horizontal and inclination is called the angle of repose. Using summation of forces
along the x-axis and y-axis, it can be equated to zero. Hence,

the normal force is equal to and the friction is equal to .

From this definition we will get,

In this part, every trial the plane was being inclined such that the wooden block was
observed in a uniform sliding motion. The data for vertical height h and horizontal distance b
were then recorded simultaneously in each trial. Given these vertical height and horizontal
distance we then calculated the tangent of the angle and the angle of repose using the equation,

On the last part of the experiment, it concerns about determination of maximum forces
that causes uniform motion. For this part, we inclined the plane initially at 10º, instead of 20º due
to carelessness. Hence, we were still allowed to have same data as what we were told. Using
Newton’s First Law of Motion, we determined the theoretical value of Wp that will cause the
block to slide up at a constant speed. The forces acting on the block are Wp (weight of the pan +
weights added), Wb (weight of the block + weights added), f (frictional force), and N (Normal
force).

This formula aided us to solve for the calculated value for Wp using the average
coefficient of friction from Table 1. The observed value on the experiment for this part served as
the experimental value. Comparing the two values, we accumulated minimal errors ranging from
0 to 5%.
 Thus, through this experiment, I can conclude that one great factor or the quantity that
affects the friction is its coefficient value. This value is used to determine the constant
proportionality of frictional force to normal force which acts on the body. Also, adding up to the
previous conclusions, we were able to establish the relationship between the limiting angle and
. The tangent of the limiting angle is equal to the coefficient of friction . Consequently,
these observations prove the theories on friction.