Advertisements
Advertisements
Question
The free surface of oil in a tanker, at rest, is horizontal. If the tanker starts accelerating the free surface will be titled by an angle θ. If the acceleration is a ms–2, what will be the slope of the free surface?
Advertisements
Solution
The behaviour of a liquid contained in a horizontally accelerated vessel can be understood by understanding the behaviour of a pendulum suspended from the ceiling of a horizontally accelerated trolley.

Every fluid element attains an equilibrium position under the action of gravity and pseudo-force. The free surface of the liquid orients itself perpendicular to the direction of net effective gravity.
tan θ = a/g
Suppose a tanker accelerates along the x-axis with acceleration a, the free surface of the tanker will not be horizontal because pseudo force acts as shown in the diagram.

Consider an elementary particle of the oil of mass m.
The acting forces on the particle with respect to the tanker are shown in the figure alongside.
Now, balancing forces (as the particle is in equilibrium) along the inclined direction of the surface.
ma = pseudo force
mg = weight of small part of the oil.
Along the free surface,
Net force = 0
⇒ ma cos θ = mg sin θ
⇒ a = g tan θ
⇒ θ = tan-1(a/g)
APPEARS IN
RELATED QUESTIONS
The surface tension of water at 0°C is 75.5 dyne/cm. Calculate surface tension of water at 25°C.
(α for water = 2.7×10-3/°C)
The contact angle between water and glass is 0°. When water is poured in a glass to the maximum of its capacity, the water surface is convex upward. The angle of contact in such a situation is more than 90°. Explain.
If more air is pushed in a soap bubble, the pressure in it
Water rises in a vertical capillary tube up to a length of 10 cm. If the tube is inclined at 45°, the length of water risen in the tube will be
A capillary tube of radius 1 mm is kept vertical with the lower end in water. (a) Find the height of water raised in the capillary. (b) If the length of the capillary tube is half the answer of part , find the angle θ made by the water surface in the capillary with the wall.
Two large glass plates are placed vertically and parallel to each other inside a tank of water with separation between the plates equal to 1 mm. Find the rise of water in the space between the plates. Surface tension of water = 0.075 Nm−1.
Find the force exerted by the water on a 2 m2 plane surface of a large stone placed at the bottom of a sea 500 m deep. Does the force depend on the orientation of the surface?
A hollow spherical body of inner and outer radii 6 cm and 8 cm respectively floats half-submerged in water. Find the density of the material of the sphere.
Obtain an expression for the capillary rise or fall using the forces method.
Numerical Problem.
A stone weighs 500 N. Calculate the pressure exerted by it if it makes contact with a surface of area 25 cm2.
How is surface tension related to surface energy?
Obtain an expression for the excess of pressure inside a
- liquid drop
- liquid bubble
- air bubble
Why coffee runs up into a sugar lump (a small cube of sugar) when one corner of the sugar lump is held in the liquid?
Two small drops of mercury each of radius 'R' coalesce to form a large single drop. The ratio of the total surface energies before and after the change is ____________.
The excess of pressure, due to surface tension, on a spherical liquid drop of radius 'R' is proportional to ______.
Why is raindrop spherical in nature?
The sufrace tension and vapour pressure of water at 20°C is 7.28 × 10–2 Nm–1 and 2.33 × 103 Pa, respectively. What is the radius of the smallest spherical water droplet which can form without evaporating at 20°C?
The excess pressure inside a liquid drop is 500 Nm-2. If the radius of the drop is 2 mm, the surface tension of the liquid is x × 10-3 Nm-1. The value of x is ______.
Find the work done when a drop of mercury of radius 2 mm breaks into 8 equal droplets. [Surface tension of mercury = 0.4855 J/m2].
