| MadSci Network: Physics |
The way I would do it would be:
You need to fill the bath with enough water that you can go completely
underwater. Now mark the bath at the level that the the water reaches. Get
in the bath and go totally under the water.
Now mark (or get someone else to mark) the level the water is at. If you
have the size (length, width, etc) of the bath it should be straightforward to
calculate the amount of water that is moved. (Which will be equal to: "length"
of the bath x the "width" x the difference in water level. "Length" and
"width" must take into account any rounded corners! What you actually need
is the area of the surface of the water in the tub.) This will be easier if the
bath is square so you may like another way which is easier, but has more
cleaning up.
The way Archimedes did it (according to legend) was to fill the bath to the
brim and then measure how much water overflowed.
To do it this way:
The first thing you want to do is know how much water you have in the bath.
So measure how much you put in it with a bucket of known size.
Fill the bath to the top.
Go completely under the water. Then get out of the tub.
Measure how much water is left in the bath after you get out. The volume of
water that is missing (amount you started with - amount left) will be your
volume.
Mop up the bathroom.
If you want to see more, not neccesarily on measuring yourself, but on the
experiment,
try here:
www.juliantrubin.com.
Or here:
www.light-science.com.
Happy bath-time. :)
Try the links in the MadSci Library for more information on Physics.