There are many classroom demonstrations, such as the ball-and-ring experiment, for showing the existence of thermal expansion of solids. The coefficient of linear expansion α (= increase in length divided by the original length times the change in temperature) may be measured in high school laboratories using a number of methods.1–4 In this paper we describe an especially simple experiment for determining α for a metal rod. It is based on the well-known optical lever method and is suitable for either a laboratory experiment or a classroom exercise.
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James S. Walker, Physics, 3rd ed.(Pearson Prentice Hall, Upper Saddle River, NJ, 2007), p. 521.
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© 2007 American Association of Physics Teachers.
2007
American Association of Physics Teachers
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