1. Lab Safety Policies Don’t stand on lab chairs
Don’t sit or stand on lab tables
No dangling jewelry or loose clothes.
No open toed shoes.
Be careful with sharp corners.
Recall location of phone and first-aid kit.
Report ALL injuries
Point out where the phone and first-aid kit are located – make sure the first aid kit is turned so it is easily visible.
Report all injuries that occur in your lab to one of the lab supervisors.

2. Engineering 1182 Lab Overview Team Design/Build Project
Details are in your course packet: read them and
make sure you understand!
Roller Coaster
Design
Documentation
Building
Testing
Report
Presentation
This slide provides an overview of the areas that students will be responsible for during the quarter. It is essential to stress that they need to read and understand the material in their course packet. We will not be providing a more detailed overview in the instruction slides.
The picture shows a Roller Coaster built by student team in Summer ‘03. Duct tape to hold the roller coaster supports to the table is STRICTLY PROHIBITED

3. Overview of Labs Lab 1 Introduction to Roller Coaster Design Lab 2
Energy Losses
Lab 3
Circuit Prototyping
Lab 4
Speed Sensor Calibration
Lab 5
Building Session #1
Lab 6
Building Session #2
Lab 7
Building Session #3
Lab 8
Final Construction - Preliminary Testing of Design
Lab 9
Final Testing of Design
Lab 10
Oral Presentations
In Physics, the word ‘conservation’ means that it does not change with time. Energy could certainly change form,(e.g. from P.E to K.E), but the overall energy of the system remains conserved.

4. Roller Coaster Dynamics-1: Energy Conservation

5. Physics Concept - Energy
ENERGY is a conserved property of an object that relates to its ability to do work. Energy can have a number of forms, for example mechanical, electrical, chemical, or nuclear. E
Units: Joules or N-m (Newton-meter).
There are different formulas describing different forms of energy.
In Physics, the word ‘conservation’ means that it does not change with time. Energy could certainly change form,(e.g. from P.E to K.E), but the overall energy of the system remains conserved.

6. Law of Conservation of Energy (COE)
Energy can neither be created nor destroyed.
Energy can only be changed from one form to another.
In Physics, the word ‘conservation’ means that it does not change with time. Energy could certainly change form,(e.g. from P.E to K.E), but the overall energy of the system remains conserved.

7. Energy Transfers
As the ball rolls down the roller coaster track, some energy of the moving ball is:
Lost to friction and dissipated as heat
Spent in overcoming Air Resistance
Lost to Structural Deformation
Converted to Sound Energy
Unwanted
Energy
Losses !
Energy transferred away from the ball is sometimes called Energy Losses because the energy is lost from what we’re interested in (in this case the ball).

8. Energy Transfers (continued)
In general, energy transferred away from the ball will NOT come back, and so the total mechanical energy of the ball will be always decreasing.
In the real world, we cannot avoid losses but can only MINIMIZE and/or ALLOW for them.
While it’s possible to conceive of air currents pushing the ball and adding some energy, in an environment like the lab rooms any “gain” will be negligible and should be ignored.

9. Let’s put it together !
For the ball rolling along the roller coaster track, between any two subsequent points:
𝑃𝐸 1 + 𝑇𝐾𝐸 1 + 𝑅𝐾𝐸 1 = 𝑃𝐸 2 + 𝑇𝐾𝐸 2 + 𝑅𝐾𝐸 2 +"𝐸𝑛𝑒𝑟𝑔𝑦 𝐿𝑜𝑠𝑠𝑒𝑠"
While it’s possible to conceive of air currents pushing the ball and adding some energy, in an environment like the lab rooms any “gain” will be negligible and should be ignored.

10. Design Considerations
You will be estimating the velocity of the ball at selected points along your roller coaster track using energy calculations to:
Make sure the velocity into turns is not too high (making banking difficult)
Make sure that the ball can reach the top of vertical loops
Make sure that the ball will not fly off the top of bumps

11. Assignments
Lab Memo (Team)