IB physics group 4 project

Dr.Scholl

Dr.Scholl

Active member
so im in ib physics right now and its time to do our group 4 projects. our class was given the topic of transportation, and my group came up with gasoline. Now i was the one who thought of the idea but its now coming back to hurt me. My original idea was to find the relationship between octanes of gas and mpgs. my physics teacher told me it was more of a chemistry thing and now im stuck trying to find a way to relate gasoline to physics. I can tell you that it isnt working out that great. any help or ideas would be rewarded with +k

spark notes: if your too lazy to read the thread you will be too lazy to help me...
 
Well gasoline has energy stored in it right? Find out an ideal MPG if there were no friction in the engine or energy lost to heat and then find the actual MPG you would get and see how much energy was lost and how efficient the engine was. The seems pretty physicsy to me.
 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carnot_cycle

Like the one guy says, comparing if the engine was an actual carnot engine and seeing the MPG vs. a real life scenario is a good idea.

Comparing octane rating won't work as much. There is a formula based on the various hydrocarbons that gives you an octane rating, but the higher the octane isn't necessarily a gas that will give you a higher mpg. The higher octane means the gas burns at a lower and more consistent temperature which is needed for the higher performance engines.
 
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