Lab: Heat of Combustion

Lab: Heat of Combustion

2/18/2014:

           After Mrs. Friedmann checked in the homework, we went over the pre-lab questions (blue sheet). Some of these questions were new to the unit and proved to be challenging. The key to these questions can be found on moodle here. We then moved on to the lab for today.

The Lab:

           The Heat of Combustion Lab involved hanging a can of water over a burning candle, all inside a calorimeter. Some of the data we kept note of was the difference in water temperature and the difference of candle mass. For the purposes of the lab write-up, we are basing our calculations on the assumption that all the heat lost by the candle was gained by the water. Since our heat formula can't be used for the heat energy of the candle, we were told to instead find the heat gained by the water and assume this was the same as the heat lost by the candle. 

          For this lab, we will also need to use a formula for the combustion reaction that took place. This should include heat as one of the products and the use of C25H52 (paraffin) for the candle.

The homework for tonight is:

1) The lab write up is due Thursday

2) There is a new webassign due by Wednesday night

Tomorrow's scribe is:

Serene P.