Physics - Speed of Sound

Worksheet

Pre Practical Questions:

1) Sound cannot travel through space because sound needs a medium to travel.
Sound is a longitudinal wave and it needs the particles of the medium to
propagate the sound energy in order for it to travel.
2) Sound would travel faster through water than air because the particles of water
are closer to each other than air. This would cause the water particles to transfer
the energy more and more faster than if the medium would have been air.

Results:

Time (s) Distance (m) Speed (m/s)

Test 1 0.67 seconds 204 m 304.48 m/s

Test 2 0.54 seconds 204 m 377.78 m/s

Average Speed =
𝑆𝑝𝑒𝑒𝑑 𝑜𝑓 𝑇𝑒𝑠𝑡 1 + 𝑆𝑝𝑒𝑒𝑑 𝑜𝑓 𝑇𝑒𝑠𝑡 2 304.48 + 377.78
2
= 2
= 341. 13 𝑚/𝑠.
Discussion Questions:

1) The investigation was conducted at the Pune branch of Indus International

School. It was conducted at the open ground where the weather conditions
were: breezy, cloudy, the temperature was around 25o C. For the first condition,
the breeze does affect the speed of sound in air. If the direction of the breeze is
parallel to the direction in which sound is travelling, then the speed of sound
increases. If the direction of the wind is against or opposite to the speed of
sound, the speed of sound is slower. In this case, the speed of sound was
perpendicular to the direction of the sound and thus, partially affected it. The
second condition, cloudy, did not affect the investigation. The third condition,
the temperature also affects the speed of sound in air. Since heat energy
determines the kinetic energy of particles, if the temperature is higher the
particles of the medium are vibrating faster and faster and thus increase the
speed of sound. If the heat energy is less, there are slower vibrations and less
kinetic energy. This causes sound to travel slower. Therefore, in this case the
temperature was normal therefore, the speed of sound wasn’t affected much.

2) Under normal atmospheric conditions, the speed of sound in dry air at sea level
is 343 m/s. The value of the speed of sound that was found in this experiment
was 341.13 m/s. Therefore, there was only a difference of 2 m/s, indicating that
the value of the factors affecting the speed of sound in the investigation were
almost equal to the factors affecting the speed of sound in dry air at sea level
under normal atmospheric conditions.

3) Factors such as the humidity, height above sea level, background noise could
have impacted the accuracy of the data gathered in this experiment. The
experiment’s location could be the best fit solution to match all 3 of the factors
to increase the accuracy of the data.