Bending of a beam: an improvised instructional tool for the determination of density of a liquid

Abstract

Abstract An improvised instructional tool has been designed for the determination of density of a liquid by employing the elastic property of a metal bar. If a metal beam supported at two ends be loaded at the middle, then a depression is produced. These depressions are recorded by a travelling microscope for a known mass and a known volume of the test liquid whose density is to be measured, hanged as load at the middle of the bar. If the recorded depression is plotted against the respective mass and respective volume of the test liquid taken, a straight line is obtained in both the cases. The density of the test liquid is obtained from the slope of these two straight lines.