Term 1 Class 8

The City School

Handout #: 4.7

Topic: Heating and Cooling

By reading this handout, learners will be able to:

➢ Recognise the need for a scale of temperature and use the Celsius scale of temperature.
➢ Recognise the values of the Boiling Point and the Freezing Point of water and some typical
temperatures on the Celsius Scale.
➢ Recognise that Heat is a form of energy which flows when there is a difference in temperature.
➢ Recognise that heat will flow more easily through good thermal conductors than poor
conductors.
➢ Explain the heating curve of water.

Introduction

When we touch a piece of ice, we feel cold. Similarly, if we touch a heated iron, we feel burning
hot (don't touch hot things though). Have you ever wondered why this happens?

The feeling of hot or cold is the transfer of heat energy from one body to another. When we touch
a hot body, we receive heat from the hot body and feel hot. Similarly, heat flows from our body to
ice when we touch it. Then we feel cold. So, the flow of heat from one body to another body
causes the sensation (feelings) of hot or cold.

If we rub our hands, we feel hot. Iron gets hot when rubbed against a stone. How does it happen?

Well, to know the answer to these kinds of phenomena we need to understand the nature of
matter and molecules in them. A matter is composed of molecules. The molecules have potential
energy stored in them. When an object is heated, it produces vibration in the molecules. Kinetic
energy is produced from molecular vibration which gives rise to heat. The heat energy of a body is
the total amount of kinetic energy of all molecules contained in the body. The more the molecules
are vibrated, the more the body contains heat.

The degree of hotness or coldness of a body is called temperature. When we say that the body has
a higher temperature, we can understand that molecules of the body are vibrating intensely.

Heat and temperature

The temperature of a body increases when it is heated. Similarly, its temperature decreases when
it is cooled. It means heat is the cause to increase or decrease the temperature of a
body. Temperature is an effect of heat.
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The difference between heat and temperature are as follows:

Thermometer

We can feel the hotness of a body by touching but can't measure its degree of hotness. We use a
thermometer to measure it. The thermometer is an instrument that is used for measuring the
degree of hotness of a body, i.e., the temperature of the body.

Structure of Thermometer
There are various types of thermometers. Here we discuss the structure of a simple thermometer.
A simple thermometer consists of a thick-walled glass tube and a capillary tube of a fine bore. Both
ends are closed. A cylindrical structure is provided at one end of the tube called a bulb. The bulb
has a shining white liquid metal called mercury. Mercury is a good conductor of hea t since it is a
metal.
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Working of Thermometer
When the bulb of a thermometer is placed in contact with a hot body, the mercury is heated and
starts to expand. When it expands, its level rises in the capillary tube. If the mercury is heated
more and more, its level gradually rises in the capillary tube. The temperature is measured
according to the rise of mercury levels in the capillary tube. The working of the thermometer is
based on the principle that "A liquid expands on heating and contracts on cooling".

Liquids used in Thermometer

Mercury
Mercury is a liquid metal. It expands uniformly on heating. The boiling point of mercury is 357
°C, so it is useful to measure high temperatures. As the freezing point of mercury is -39 °C, the
mercury thermometer cannot be used to measure very low temperature especially in cold
regions.

Alcohol
Alcohol is a colorless liquid. It expands six times greater than mercury on heating. Alcohol is
quite cheaper than mercury. It can distinctly be visible by coloring. An alcohol thermometer
can measure very low temperature as it melts at -115 °C. Since alcohol boils at 78 °C, it is not
useful to measure higher temperatures.

Types of Thermometers

There are different types of thermometers

for measuring the temperatures of
different things like air, our bodies, food
and many other things. There are clinical
thermometers, laboratory thermometers,
digital remote thermometers. Among
these, the commonly used thermometers
are clinical thermometers and laboratory
thermometers.
Different types of thermometers
Clinical Thermometer

These thermometers are used to measure the temperature of the human body, at home, clinics and
hospitals. There are temperature scales on either side of the mercury thread, one in Celsius scale and
the other in Fahrenheit scale. Since the Fahrenheit scale is more sensitive than the Celsius scale,
body temperature is measured in °F only. A clinical thermometer indicates temperatures from a
minimum of 35 °C or 94 °F to a maximum of 42 °C or 108 °F.

Laboratory Thermometers
Lab thermometers are used to measure the temperature in school and other laboratories for
scientific research. They are also used in the industry as they can measure temperatures higher than
what clinical thermometers can record. A laboratory thermometer has only the Celsius scale ranging
from −10 °C to 110 °C.
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Melting and Boiling Point:

Pure, crystalline solids have a characteristic melting point, the temperature at which the solid melts to
become a liquid. The transition between the solid and the liquid is so sharp for small samples of a pure
substance that melting points can be measured to 0.1oC. The melting point of solid oxygen, for example,
is -218.4oC. Liquids have a characteristic temperature at which they turn into solids, known as
their freezing point. In theory, the melting point of a solid should be the same as the freezing point of
the liquid. In practice, small differences between these quantities can be observed.

When a liquid is heated, it eventually reaches a temperature at which the vapor pressure is large enough
that bubbles form inside the body of the liquid. This temperature is called the boiling point. Once the
liquid starts to boil, the temperature remains constant until all of the liquid has been converted to a gas.
The normal boiling point of water is 100oC.
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Heat Energy:

Energy, in physics, the capacity for doing work. It may exist in potential, kinetic, thermal,
electrical, chemical, nuclear, or other various forms.

Heat is the form of energy that is transferred between systems or objects with different
temperatures (flowing from the high-temperature system to the low-temperature system). Also
referred to as heat energy or thermal energy. Heat is typically measured in calories or joules.

Heat transfer is when heat energy flows from the object of higher temperature to an object with a
lower temperature. It will never do the reverse.

Phase Change Graphs

• A heating or cooling curve shows how the temperature of a substance changes with time
• The 'flat' sections of the graph indicate that there is no change in temperature over time, hence the
substance is undergoing a phase change.
• The regions of the graph that are not flat indicate that the substance is being heated or cooled
down.
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Heating Curves

• As energy is being supplied to a solid substance, its temperature increases until it reaches its
melting point.
• The temperature remains constant until the substance has melted completely.
• If energy continues to be supplied, the liquid substance warms up until the boiling point is
reached, and the substance vaporizes.
• Then, the temperature of the gas increases.