Physics 4531

PRECAUTIONARY STEPS FOR INVESTIGATIVE EXPERIMENTS

Paper 3: Question 3 and 4 [1 mark]

No. Type of experiment Precautions that can be taken

involving;
1 Light
2 Spring
a. Experiment must be carried out in darkened room.
b. Lens, screen and object must be in line
c. Avoid parallax error by placing the eye such that
the line of view is perpendicular to the scale of the
ruler.
a. make sure the spring is not loaded beyond the
elastic limit. (spring return to original length when
load is taken off).
b. Avoid parallax error by placing the eye such that
the line of view is perpendicular to the scale of the
ruler.

3 Electric a. All connections must be secure/tight.

4. Heat
5 Measuring instruments
such as ammeter,
voltmeter, metre rule ...
b. Off the switch after readings are taken to prevent
wires from heating up (resistance increase)
c. Avoid parallax error by placing the eye such that
the line of view is perpendicular to the scale of the
ammeter/ voltmeter.
a. Liquid must be stirred constantly so that
temperature rises evenly.
b. Alluminium block must be wrapped with
insulating material to prevent heat lost.
c. Thermometer bulb should be smeared with oil to
give better thermal contact with the block.
d. Avoid parallax error by placing the eye such that
the line of view is perpendicular to the scale of the
thermometer.
a. Avoid parallax error by placing the eye such that
the line of view is perpendicular to the scale read.
b. Take into account zero error of instrument.

* [Student can give more than one answer for this question. No penalty for the answer which
is unsuitable]

* unacceptable answer
Avoid parallax error. [without any further explanation]