Heat capacity

• Investigate the Specific Heat Capacity of a Solid Block

  1. Insulate the block with an insulating layer

  2. Measure the starting temperature of the block

  3. Connect the power supply and start stopwatch

  4. Measure the potential difference, V, of the power supply

  5. Measure the temperature of the block

  6. Turn off the heater and work out the temperature change

  7. Calculate the power of the heater using PV

  8. Calculate the specific heat capacity
• Specific Heat Capacity experiment

  • Use a power supply, thermometer, heater, and black material with two holes
  • Measure current, potential difference, temperature change, and mass of block
• Calculate the specific heat capacity

  1. Work out the energy transferred from power supply to heater's thermal energy store

  2. Energy transferred to the material's thermal energy store by heating

  3. Use the equation c = (E)/(m*ΔT) to find the specific heat capacity
• When the power is turned on, the current in the circuit does work on the heater
• Energy is transferred electrically from the power supply to the heater's thermal energy store
• The energy transferred to the heater is given by E=P*t
• The energy transferred to the heater is then transferred to the material's thermal energy store by heating
• The value of E calculated is equal to the change in thermal energy of the block
• You can use the equation c = (E)/(m*ΔT) to find the specific heat capacity of the block
• You can do this experiment with different materials to compare their specific heat capacities
• For a liquid, place the bar and then an additional beaker with known mass of the liquid
• I've eaten five sausages, I have a high specific meat capacity
• Example calculation


  1. 80 W heater used to heat 2 kg block of metal for 200 s

  2. Temperature increases by 20 °C

  3. Specific heat capacity calculated
• Assume all energy from heater is transferred to metal block