General information

Course information 2012 and Lecture Calendar 2012  and Laboratory information 2012

Class test 1:  Monday 12 March, 17:30 to 19:30, Course I lab; covering all material covered in weeks 1-4.

Your class representatives for 2012 are  Mbongeni Ncube    and   Melo Mtombeni.

Course convener: Prof Andy Buffler, Room 5.03, RW James Building

Andy Buffler available for consultation:

• Tue: 09h00-09h45; 14h00-16h30
• Wed: 09h00-09h45
• Thu: 09h00-09h45

List of errata for 3rd Edition of the textbook (prescribed)       

Formula sheet to be used in final examinations:     Mechanics (first semester)   Elec & Mag (second semester)

 

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Lecture notes

• Lecture notes for Andy Buffler's mechanics section here
• Some problems and worked solutions (from Aaron Titus at Highpoint University)
• Solutions to selected problems in MM notes 1 and 2
• Solutions to the four momentum principle problems in MM notes 2  (note that example 1 and 2 were changed slightly, see new version of lecture notes above)
• other lecturers might make their lecture notes available

         Thermal physics

• Entropy Slides
• Gas Law Slides

         Electricity and magnetism ... notes may follow

Some other useful resources to look at

• Matter and Interactions home page
• PhET simulations (University of Colorado at Boulder)
• Physlets (Davidson College)
• Open Source Physics

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Class tests

• Class Test 1     Solutions   Note: Class test 1 will be a two hour evening test.
• Class Test 2     Solutions
• Class Test 3     Solutions
• Class Test 4     Solutions

Class tests from previous years:
 CT1_2009  CT1_2009 solutions      CT2_2009  CT2_2009 solutions   CT3_2009  CT3_2009 solutions   CT4_2009  CT4_2009 solutions
 CT1_2010  CT1_2010 solutions      CT2_2010  CT2_2010 solutions   CT3_2010  CT3_2010 solutions   CT4_2010  CT4_2010 solutions

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VPython illustrative programs (mechanics)

You will probably need to click with the mouse to move from section to section of these programs.

• Position vectors
• Displacement vectors
• Average velocity
• Sun-Earth-planet orbits.  Different versions (useful)   Orbit1   Orbit2   Orbit3   Orbit4   Orbit5   Orbit6        orbit with impulse code (used in class 16 March)
• Constant force: position as sum of three vectors
• Constant force: gun that never misses
• Projectile motion: Without and with air drag
• Orbital motion: planet around a star
• Rotate, Vibrate, Translate  Diatomic molecule
• Alpha on gold scattering
• Alpha on alpha scattering

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Weekly problem sets

• WPS for week 0 and solutions
• WPS for week 1 and solutions
• WPS for week 2 and solutions
• WPS for week 3 and solutions and Vpython
• WPS for week 4 and solutions and MiniLab
• WPS for week 5 and solutions
• WPS for week 6 and solutions
• WPS for week 7 and solutions and MiniLab
• WPS for week 8 and solutions
• WPS for week 9 and solutions
• WPS for week 10 and solutions
• WPS for week 11 and solutions
• WPS for week 12 and solutions
• WPS for week 13 and solutions  
• WPS for week 14 and solutions    
• WPS for week 15 and solutions     sumfield.py
• WPS for week 16 and solutions     bwire.py
• WPS for week 17 and solutions
• WPS for week 18 and solutions
• WPS for week 19 and solutions
• WPS for week 20 and solutions
• WPS for week 21 and solutions
• WPS for week 22 and solutions
• WPS for week 23 and solutions
• WPS for week 24 and solutions

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VPython tutorials

[Computer science types:  check out GlowScript too]

• Introduction to VPython
• VPython tutorial 1  28 February Ball in a box
• Further class exercise: Planet orbiting a star
• VPython tutorial 2  10 April   Voyage to the moon
• VPython tutorial 3   24 July  Rocket with a single thruster 
• VPython tutorial 4  21 August    Charged particle in a dipole electric field
• VPython tutorial 5 25 September Charged particle in a dipole magnetic field  magnetic loop_incomplete.py

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