Damped Oscillations— A Smartphone Approach (Journal Article)

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Abstract: We report the study of an oscillating pendulum under various damping conditions. A smartphone was used as a pendulum and, at the same time, as a data recorder. Results show that the smartphone is an effective and reliable tool for performing educational activities, providing students with a variety of ways to learn new content and physical concepts. It offers the opportunity to carry out experiments in the classroom, laboratory, or at home. In the experiments performed, increasing the cross-sectional area of the pendulum increases the damping coefficient slightly, and rapidly decreases the oscillation amplitude as time passes. Results suggest that the time necessary to decrease the amplitude by half is inversely proportional to the cross-sectional area of the pendulum. As expected, there was no significant variation in the period nor the angular frequency as the amplitude changed due to the air–pendulum drag properties and the slow pendulum speed.