how to calculate the mass of an astronaut?

 

For teacher part 1

A video that explains the whole manipulation for calculating the spring constant: measure with "tracker" and the use of OpenOffice. The spring constant is needed to make the experience of finding the mass of an astronaut in zero gravity. It is possible to give this constant for students to save time in this case, simply suspend an "unknown" mass and measuring the period of oscillation to find the mass (see the relation between the periode and the mass.)

If you use 2 springs with constant as k1 and k2, here's the formula.

To download a ppt presentation

(194 Mbyte)

For teacher part 2: different files to teach

To download the spring images (Different forces) (for Tracker)

Excel/OpenOffice file with the results of the spring constante

Movie with Frank de Winne on the ISS (235 Mb)