In this lab, the study being conducted was based on utilizing three sets of data value in order to calculate the average density through the help of the displacement method. Furthermore, the purpose of this lab was to identify the substance of the materials being tested, which in this case were a variety of pennies along with an unknown substance. In addition, the procedure being followed to get precise results focuses on calculating the mass of your substance followed by the volume of that same substance by using the displacement method which leads to calculating the density. Afterwards, the densities of each trial is converted into an overall average density per category and initially use the calculations to get to the which substance was …show more content…
However, for the most part, there were chances of observational error and so the formula used for measuring the percent error is percent error= |true value-observed value/true value|*100%. At the end of the day, through the results, (pre) pennies were made up of copper due to the fact the average density calculated was 9.5 g/mL and the density of copper is 9 g/mL. Meanwhile, the (post) pennies were most likely made out of brass due to the fact that the average density measured was 8 g/mL although the actual value was 8.4 g/mL. Also, the calculations weren’t as exact which is why there was a 5.6% error in determining the density of the pre pennies as well as a 4.8% error is calculating the density of the post pennies, however the values were pretty close meaning that there must have been a slight source of error. On the other hand, when calculating the average density of the unknown substance, the overall outcome was 7 g/mL and it was implied that the substance was Zinc, however it was Tin which meant that there was an observational error and there was approximately 4.1%