Physics EE, Topic related to mechanics... IBS is my last resort.

[Ace.face]

Thanks in advance for reading this,

Hey everyone,

So I've picked Physics as my subject area for my EE...things aren't going so well.

My supervisor has suggested I pick a topic related to mechanics as the IB likes them more and he told me to try to keep it simple.

I've had a few topics but they have all been denied by my supervisor as he wants me to find a topic that would bring me an A/B.

I've had " What factors affect the conservation of energy on Newton's pendulum", or something along the lines of that where i was to increase the size of each ball exponentially.

If anyone of you could only just show me the door, that would be great.

and again, thank you so much.

[HiggsHunter]

My supervisor has suggested I pick a topic related to mechanics as the IB likes them more and he told me to try to keep it simple.

Did your supervisor explain why he believes that the IB likes mechanics EE topics more than others?

[Ace.face]

Yes, because there is a lower chance of error when it comes to mechanics, and most EEs he has seen that have received an A are mechanics-based.

I would have picked another subject but I prefer physics over the others but my physics teacher is very reliable ( over my other teachers ).

[HiggsHunter]

That's interesting. In general I should have thought that electrical experiments would have fewer errors, as electrical parameters can readily be measured with high precision. Mechanics ones are often subject to the vagaries of phenomena such as friction and air resistance.

The main problem I see with an EE on a Newton's pendulum with balls of variable size would be to devise an experiment that allows you to make quantitative measurements, instead of just observing the behaviour. It should be quite possible to assemble pendulum configurations that have never been described before, and comparing your analysis with the actual behaviour would be quite interesting. But without special equipment it would be difficult to make measurements of critical parameters such as the micron spacing between the balls, or even the height of the pendulum swings. Have you thought about this?

[Ace.face]

That's not something I thought about , but I will inform my supervisor if there is a way to make these measurements. Then again, maybe that is why he denied my topic. Would you suggest I write my EE on something along the lines of electricity?

I think my problem is that, every question/topic I come up with, I think that it can be simply answered on paper.

[HiggsHunter]

It should be possible to do a good EE in any branch of physics, but if your supervisor prefers mechanics perhaps your school lab is better equipped for experiments in that field? He should explain why he denied your topic, so that you have a better idea of how to formulate an acceptable one.

Yes, ideally you should choose a topic that is not too complicated to analyse theoretically, and that you can measure experimentally as well.