Viscosity Science Lab Essay Example for Free

Viscosity Science Lab Essay Purpose: To determine of changing the viscosity will affect the time it takes for a marble to flow through a liquid. Hypothesis: If a marble is dropped into dish soap and corn syrup, than I predict that the marble in the dish soap will travel faster than the marble in the corn syrup because I know that the viscosity of the corn syrup is thicker than then the viscosity of the dish soap. Also, the particles in the corn syrup are more compact than those in the dish soap. This makes the marble sink faster in the dish soap than the corn syrup. Apparatus: * 2 identical marbles * 250 Graduated Cylinders of 250mL * 250mL of dish soap * 250mL of corn syrup * 1 timer/stopwatch Procedure: 1. Drop one marble in the graduated cylinder of corn syrup and begin timing 2. Continue timing until the marble hits to the bottom and stop the timer 3. Record the time result in the qualitative chart 4. Record all observations in the quantitative chart 5. Repeat all steps from 1-4 fir the graduated cylinder of the dish soap 6. Clean up the work area Observations: Qualitative Observations Dish Soap| Corn Syrup| * Green * Quick * Pungent * Bubbles * Translucent * Level rose * Bright * Not Viscous| * Level Rose * Very Slow * Bubbles *  Translucent * Pungent * Viscous * Muted * Dark| Quantitative Observations: Dish Soap| Corn Syrup| 7.24 seconds| 87.25 seconds| Data: See graph attached at the end of this lab. Conclusion: Yes, my hypothesis was correct. I discovered that a marble travels approximately 7 seconds in 250mL of dish soap and approximately 87 seconds in corn syrup. Also, I found that the corn syrup is more viscous than the dish soap which is what caused the slow and fast sinking. This result occurred because the particles in the corn syrup are much larger than normal particles. These large particles within the corn syrup take up more space. Since the particles take up so much space, they tend to block each other and not let them pass through. It is very difficult for large particles to move past each other unlike small, tiny particles, like those in the dish soap. The particles in the dish soap are very small and can move more freely and quickly. In the dish soap, the particles are very small and can move past each other easily when compared to the particles in the corn syrup. Another reason also contributed to the result of this experiment. Attraction. Some types of particles tend to attract more than others and that is exactly what happened in the corn syrup. The particles in the corn syrup attracted more than the dish soap. The large particles in the corn syrup held tightly to each other, that when the marble fell in that it made it hard for the marble to pass through more than one particle at a time. IN the dish soap, the particles did not attract as much as the corn syrup which let the marble move easily and quickly through the liquid. The strength of attraction as well as the particle size is important in determining a fluid’s viscosity. Application: This viscosity experiment can be used in real-life when making sun-tan lotion as well as other cosmetic products. It is important for the lotion to be viscous because the lotion could not be applied and spread around the  body if the cream was not viscous enough to suit its use. It would drip all over you! It wouldn’t dry or stay in one place. Many well-known businesses hire highly educated scientists to calculate the right viscosity level and if it is not correct nobody would buy the product. People who once thought highly of the product would think that it has gone bad and useless. Profits would go down for the business and since nobody would by it, the business would have to be shut down. Many jobs would be lost and many businesses would have to be shut down. Jobs from the factory, the transport services, the marketers, and the retail stores would be lost and many people left with nothing but a pension. Viscosity is seen all around the world and it is very important for the measurement of viscosity to be pin-point and accurate.