Physics 124 - General Physics I

Online resources

Here is a short list of useful links to some learning resources for this course: 

        Wilson/Buffa Companion website:   http://www.aw-bc.com/wilson/  
       (Select the text we are using, then use the “Jump to” drop-down menu to choose a chapter. If that doesn't work, choose a previous edition, the black one.) 

Some of the material in Chapter 14 about waves can be illustrated by simulations.  Here are some that I will use:

I use several simulations from Dan Russell's Acoustics and Vibration Animations during the last two weeks of this class.
In particular, look at these simulations using a web browser with Java plugin: 

The types of waves are shown here:
http://www.acs.psu.edu/drussell/Demos/waves/wavemotion.html 
For this course, we are mostly concerned with transverse waves (strings) and longitudinal waves (sound).

This shows the superposition of waves traveling in opposite directions to produce standing waves (the 3rd figure) and shows the formation of beats (the 4th and last figure):
http://www.acs.psu.edu/drussell/Demos/superposition/superposition.html

The standing waves I showed in class rely on the reflection of waves from a hard boundary. This is discussed here:
http://www.acs.psu.edu/drussell/Demos/reflect/reflect.html

This one gives more detail on standing waves in pipes:
http://www.acs.psu.edu/drussell/Demos/StandingWaves/StandingWaves.html

Here's one on the Doppler Effect: http://www.acs.psu.edu/drussell/Demos/doppler/doppler.html

You need to be able to sort out the difference between the motion of a single point on the wave medium and the shape of the wave at an instant of time. See:
http://www.acs.psu.edu/drussell/Demos/wave-x-t/wave-x-t.html

On another web site, here is a Ripple Tank simulation:  http://www.falstad.com/ripple/

This Fourier series simulation shows how sounds can be built up from the fundamental frequency and its harmonics:
http://www.falstad.com/fourier/  (might be loud if you turn on the sound!) I will use the square wave and show how it is built up from odd harmonics.