5 ms·
How to Measure Planck’s Constant Using Lego
- deelowe 12y ago* Plus several hundred dollars of non-lego equipment.
- Gargoyle888 12y agoYea. A really enticing title. But disappointingly complex.
- _almosnow 12y agoExactly, plus the actual stuff that makes the measurement.
- danpat 12y agoThe "shadow sensor and PID feedback" they're using could be scrapped and replaced with manual control. It wouldn't be as fancy, but it would save you the $60 photodiode. The only other sensor being used is a current sensor, a.k.a a multimeter. You could make a real ghetto version of this jig with a laser pointer, multimeter and variable power supply. All the laser pointer does is point at the wall and show you the position of your balance beam.
- danpat 12y agoI strongly suspect a working setup could be made for <$50 in electronics parts. The LabJack ADC, Phidgets DAC and Photodiode make up nearly $450 of the total cost. An Arduino, breadboard and a few components could probably do the same for a whole lot cheaper. The concept of "low cost" here is relative to a dedicated lab watt balance machine, which is probably thousands of dollars.