ELECTRIC CHARGE AND ELECTROSTATICS

NAME: John Hafele Date: 7/5/2023

Lab Partner’s: Connor Pascual, Alexander Hernandez, Dylan Mandel

Laboratory Report

1. Rub the dark and white faces of the wands together gently for I0 to 15 seconds. Insert the dark section
of the wand nearly to the bottom of the ice pail, being careful not to touch the ice pail. Record the
reading of the electrometer with the wand inside the pail.

Electrometer reading: -9.2

The sign of the charge carried by the dark-faced wand is: Negative
Remove the wand and record the electrometer reading after the wand is removed.

Electrometer reading: 0.5

Discharge the charge-producing wands by touching each to the shield of the ice pail. Sometimes
discharging the dark-faced wand can be somewhat of a challenge. You may need to touch the shield
several times and even blow gently on it so that the moisture in your breath helps discharge it. Rub
the charge-producing wands together, and insert the white-faced wand into the ice pail, again being
careful not to touch the ice pail. Record the reading of the electrometer.

Electrometer reading: 9

The sign of the charge carried by the white-faced wand is: Positive

Remove the wand and record the electrometer reading after the wand is removed.

Electrometer reading: 7

State your conclusions concerning the charge on each wand.

Concerning the charge on each wand, both wands contained a different charge. When the dark-faced
wand was inserted, it read a negative charge. When the white-faced wand was inserted, it read a
positive charge. The charges were inverses of each other.
2. Discharge the wands and the ice pail, and zero the electrometer. Rub the charge-producing wands
together. Insert both wands into the ice pail, being careful not to touch the ice pail with either
wand. Record the electrometer reading.

Electrometer reading: 0

What do you conclude about the total charge on the wands?

The total charge on the wands cancels each other out. The wands are equal and opposite and therefore
read a charge of zero. With one being positive and the other being negative they become zero because
opposites cancel.

3. Discharge the wands and the ice pail, and zero the electrometer. Rub the two wands together, insert
the dark-faced wand into the ice pail, and touch the ice pail. Remove the wand from the ice pail and
record the electrometer reading.

Electrometer reading: 5.9

Discharge the wands and the ice pail, and zero the electrometer. Rub the two wands together, insert
the white-faced wand into the ice pail, and touch the ice pail. Remove the wand from the ice pail and
record the electrometer reading.

Electrometer reading: -1.2

What is the difference between the results you obtained here and those you obtained in Part 2?
Explain why there is a difference.

The results in Part 2 were obtained by putting both wands in the pail making sure to not touch the pail.
The results in Part 3 were obtained by putting each wand in the pail separately and touching the pail.
They are different because when both wands are placed within the pial together they have a reading of
zero. The wands together cancel each other out. In Part 3 we put each wand in separately and they
gave off 1 negative reading and 1 positive reading. This shows they are inverses of each other, which in
turn proves the charge of the 2 wands cancel each other out

4. Discharge the wands, the proof plane, and the ice pail, and zero the electrometer. Rub the two wands
together and touch the dark-faced wand to one of the spheres. Touch the proof plane to one side of
the sphere and insert it into the ice pail without touching it. Record the electrometer reading.

Electrometer reading: 1.1

 Discharge the proof plane, touch it to the other side of the sphere, and insert it into the ice pail. Record
the electrometer reading.

Electrometer reading: 1.1

Discharge the proof plane, touch it to the top of the sphere, and insert it into the ice pail. Record the
electrometer reading.

Electrometer reading: 0.9

From this information, is the charge approximately uniformly distributed on the sphere? Explain

From our information found, we can determine that the charge is approximately uniformly distributed
across the sphere. Our data found on either side of the sphere was closely related to each other. With
the shape being a sphere, the charge should be equal no matter where on the sphere.

5. Discharge the wands, the proof plane, the sphere, and the ice pail, and zero the electrometer. BE SURE
THE POWER SUPPLY IS OFF. Connect one of the spheres to the 3000-volt jack of the power supply and
turn the power supply on. Discharge the second sphere and leave it about 50 cm from the first sphere.
Use the proof plane to check for any charge on the sphere not connected to the power supply by
touching the sphere in several places and inserting the proof plane into the ice pail. Remember to
discharge the proof plane after inserting it into the ice pail.

Is there any charge on the sphere not connected to the power supply? Justify your answer.

Yes, -0.9 was the charge amount shown on the meter. There is charge shown on the sphere not
connected to the power supply because the sphere still had charge from the air, me and my lab
members touching it, and it being moved. This charge can be from the sphere not being completely
grounded as well.

6. Now move the sphere not connected to the power supply to within about 1 cm of the one connected
to the power supply, but do not let them touch. Use the proof plane to sample the charge on the
side of the sphere farthest from the charged sphere (point A). Refer to the diagram for the locations
for points A, B, C, D, and E. Insert the proof plane into the ice pail and record the electrometer
reading.
Electrometer reading A: 2.6

Discharge the proof plane and the electrometer. Repeat the measurement for points B, C, D, and E.
Record the electrometer reading for each point in the space below.
Electrometer reading B : 2.2

Electrometer reading C : 1.3

Electrometer reading D : 0.3

Be careful not to touch the sphere connected to the power supply.

Electrometer reading E: -10

Make a sketch showing how the charge is distributed on the uncharged sphere. Explain why the
charge is distributed as it is.

The charge is distributed as it is because of the electrons that the charged sphere is giving off. The
closest point to the charged sphere had a reading of -10, a high negative number on our scale,
compared to a 2.6 on the opposite side of the sphere. Giving off negatively charged electrons from the
charged sphere caused the reading to act accordingly on the uncharged object. The closest point had
the highest negativity because it was receiving the most negative electrons to balance. The positive
electrons from the uncharged sphere take the given negative electrons and add them to their current
electrons to receive our valence number we have. With more positive than negative electrons we get
positive electron amounts, giving the data we found.
 Turn off the power supply and the electrometer.

Questions:
Show all your calculations

1. A dark-faced wand is moved to within 1.00 cm of a 5.00-cm radius metallic sphere that is insulated
from ground. The sphere is grounded while the wand is close to it. The ground wire is then
disconnected, and the wand is then moved away from the sphere. Does the sphere contain positive
charge, negative charge, or no charge? Explain the process. This process is called charging by
induction. Make a sketch showing how the charge is distributed on the sphere.

The sphere contains a negative charge if the dark faced wand is negatively charged as told. We are
told that the sphere is insulated from ground which causes nothing to happen as the wand is
brought close, but we are also told the sphere is grounded. Being grounded allows some of the
sphere’s electrons to flow to the Earth due to positive charge from the wand. Now if the ground
wire is disconnected electrons cannot move freely to the Earth anymore, and the wand is moved
away, the over all positive charge remains. Therefore, the sphere contains a positive charge.

2. Compare Coulomb’s Law to the Law of Universal Gravitation. How is the electric force like the
Gravitational force? How is it different?

To compare them both, they both use force and are both inverse square laws. To contrast the two,
Coulomb’s Law talks about the force between charges, rather than the force between two masses as
 the Law of Universal Gravitation talks about. Both Laws are inversely proportional to the square of the
distances between charges/ masses. The charges in Coulomb’s law can be repulsive or attractive with
the Gravitational force only having attractive properties. Another key difference is that the sign of the
force when dealing with Coulomb’s Law depends solely on the charges and can be negative or positive,
but when dealing with Universal Gravitation it will always be a negative force.

3. The most common isotope of hydrogen contains a proton and an electron separated by a distance
5.0 × 10−11 m. The mass of the proton is 1.67 × 10−27 kg, the mass of the electron is 9.11 ×
10−31 kg, the charge of the electron is −1.602 × 10−19 C, and the charge of the proton is
+1.602 × 10−19 C.

a. Use Newton's law of Universal Gravitation to calculate the gravitational force between the
electron and proton in the hydrogen atom.

b. Determine the electric force of attraction between the two particles.

c. How many orders of magnitude greater is the electric force between the two particles than the
gravitational force between the two particles? How important are gravitational force effects in this
case?
4. Three-point charges are arranged in a line. A –5 µC charge is placed in the center, a 3µC charge is
placed 1 m to the left and a –2 µC charge is placed 2 m to the right, as shown in the diagram.

a. What is the net force on the –2 µC charge?

b. What is the net force on the 3 µC charge?

5. A current of 0.300 A through your chest can send your heart into fibrillation, ruining the normal
rhythm of heartbeat and distributing the flow of blood (and thus oxygen) to your brain. If that current
persists for 1.34 minutes, how many conduction electrons pass through your chest? (Hint: 1 A = 1 C/s)

CONCLUSION

In the first lab the focus is on Electric Charge and Electrostatics. The equipment used for the
lab was 2 Charge Producers or referred to as wands, 1 dark colored, and 1 light colored, they are used
to fluctuate the current, a proof plate to discharge the wands, a DC voltage source to provide power, a
voltmeter to read the level of current, an ice pail, wires to provide ground and transition, and 2
spheres, 1 charged and 1 uncharged. To set up the equipment needed, the DC voltage source was
plugged into the wall and to the voltmeter. Plugged into the voltmeter were wires that attach to the
ice pail to read its status. In configurations the wands were charged by rubbing each one against the
proof plate for roughly 10 to 20 consecutive seconds.
Throughout the lab experiment various combinations of charging each wand, placing it in the
pail, reading its voltage and then taking it out and reading the voltage of the pail after the wand left
were performed. A total of 15 readings were taken throughout the lab via the voltmeter. The readings
taken from the voltmeter showed that the sign carried by the dark wand was negative, and the sign
carried by the charge from the white wand was positive. When placed in the ice pail together the
voltmeter read 0 charge, because the positive and negative charges cancelled each other out. This was
an educated guess my lab mates and I came to before placing the 2 wands in the pail together and
were proven correct in our theory.
After collecting data using just the ice pail, we began our experiments with the charged and
uncharged spheres. We found that the charged sphere was giving off a negative charge and the
uncharged sphere was giving off a positive charge. This was discovered by taking 5 readings around
the uncharged sphere which was 1 centimeter away from the charged sphere. The voltmeter found
that right in between the 2 spheres was a negative reading and grew in volts as we tested wands
around the uncharged sphere getting farther and farther away from the charged sphere. The volts
around the uncharged sphere ranged from -10 to 2.6. The -10 shows that the charged sphere was
giving off negative charges in close proximity to the uncharged sphere, and farther away from it the
positive charge contained in the uncharged sphere overpowered the negative charge that was being
given off. After all measurements were taken, the equipment was properly placed back where it goes,
and the workspace was cleaned up.
Overall, our lab went very smoothly. The sources of error that most likely occurred during our
proceedings were improper charges on the wands being tested. I mean this in 2 ways, the first is that
the wands could have been improperly charged overall, we could have not rubbed them long enough
to create a large enough charge to have been read properly. The second way I mean is that we could
have improperly discharged the wands, we could have rubbed the wands against the proof plate for
too little of a time to discharge them properly. These were the only 2 sources of error that could have
altered the results of our proceedings.
Over the course of the lab, I learned about objects and how the charge of different objects
affects the charge of literally everything. I learned how power provided to objects can provide a
specific charge, but so can grounding an object. Charges on objects influence and balance each other
out to work properly. Charges of different signs can overpower and even cancel each other out to give
a net charge of zero. We are able to see these effects of electron charges in our everyday lives. For
example, when we throw our clothes in the dryer, the dryer and the clothes rubbing against each
other give off a negative charge causing the clothes with a positive charge to stick together. This
phenomenon creates static electricity and is a common occurrence that many people don’t know
what is really happening. Most people complain about their cotton and polyester shirts sticking
together and don’t know why, but as students and educators we know there is an imbalance of
electrons occurring.