Talking Physics

I have recently been doing experiments in the Sun light as we have had a few sunny days. One of the things I had not tried before was placing thermochromic paper in the Sun.

Here you can see I have a response from the heating effects of the sunlight and just to compare I have placed my hand on the thermochromic paper.

I made a slowmo video of the response to Sun light

I used my book with the greatest albido, which incidentally is one of the most popular physics books to read by students in our library. (I really do strongly recommend this book)

You can purchase from mindsets. They have some really excellent products for teaching physics and many of their items appear in our IOP workshops.

Here is a link to a kit that includes resistance wire
http://tinyurl.com/nvj6rck

This enables you to do this with the wire behind the paper

This is a continuation of the TEP Thermocolour film kit

TEP thermochromic paper

They used to sell a much larger piece of the sheet and I am sure it is in the online catalog.

One thing I have seen and not tried yet is the modeling of the Sun’s energy incident on the surface of the Earth and how this causes seasons.
There are some great ideas in this SEP publication.
SEP thermochromic booklet

Here is a site with a really good explanation of how it works.
I usually get it out when doing diffraction gratings and path length along with my fire opal and a quick mention of Bragg’s Law.

The link to the article http://tinyurl.com/hexoyuf

I have the paper, I just need to see if I have any spheroidal objects in the house.

Great demos Dave, as usual! I love the slow motion video and the slices of thermochromic paper on the small football. It really shows nicely how the tilt of the earth axis is responsible for the seasons rather than the distance from the sun.

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