Pascals Law / Principle

- Is a principle in fluid mechanics that states that a pressure change occuring anywhere
in a confined incompressible fluid is transmitted throughout the fluid such that the same
change occurs everywhere. The Principle is stated mathematically as: P = pg( h).

P is the hydrostatic pressure, or the difference in pressure at two points within a fluid
column, due to the weight of the fluid;

p is the fluid density

g is the acceleration due to gravity

h is the height of fluid above the point of measurement, or the difference in elevation
between the two points within the fluid column.

Blaise Pascal was a French mathematician, physicist and religious philosopher, who
laid the foundation for the modern theory of probabilities. He was born on June 19,
1623, in Clermont-Ferrand, France. In the 1640s he invented the Pascaline, an early
calculator, and further validated Evangelista Torricelli's theory concerning the cause of
barometrical variations. In the 1650s, he laid the foundation of probability theory
with Pierre de Fermat and published the theological work Les Provinciales, a
groundbreaking series of letters that defended his Jansenist faith. Pascal is also widely
known for his body of notes posthumously released as the Penses. He died in Paris on
August 19, 1662.

Pascal's Law relates to pressures in fluids - in liquid or gaseous state:

if the weight of a fluid is neglected the pressure throughout an enclosed volume

will be the same
the static pressure in a fluid acts equally in all directions
the static pressure acts at right angles to any surface in contact with the fluid

When a force is applied to a contained, incompressible fluid, the pressure increases

equally in all directions throughout the fluid. This fundamental characteristic of fluids
provides the foundation for hydraulic systems found in barbershop chairs, construction
equipment, and the brakes in your car.
Because the force applied to the contained fluid is distributed throughout the system,
you can multiply the applied force through this application of Pascals Principle in the
following manner. Assume you have a closed container filled with an incompressible
fluid with two pistons of differing areas, A1 and A2. If you apply a force, F1, to the piston
of area A1, you create a pressure in the fluid which you can call P 1.

Similarly, the pressure at the second piston, P2, must be equal to F2 divided by the area
of the second piston, A2.

Since the pressure is transmitted equally throughout the fluid in all directions according
to Pascals Principle, P1 must equal P2.

Rearranging to solve for F2, you find that F2 is increased by the ratio of the areas
A2 over A1.

Therefore, you have effectively increased the applied force F1. Of course, the law of
conservation of energy cannot be violated, so the work done on the system must
balance the work done by the system. In the hydraulic lift diagram, the distance over
which F1 is applied will be greater than the distance over which F2 is applied, by the
exact same ratio as the force multiplier.

Example 1.)
A barber raises his customers chair by applying a force of 150N to a hydraulic piston of
area 0.01 m2. If the chair is attached to a piston of area 0.1 m 2, how massive a
customer can the chair raise? Assume the chair itself has a mass of 5 kg.

Answer: To solve this problem, first determine the force applied to the larger piston.

If the maximum force on the chair is 1500N, you can now determine the maximum mass
which can be lifted by recognizing that the force that must be overcome to lift the
customer is the force of gravity, therefore the applied force on the customer must equal
the force of gravity on the customer.

If the chair has a mass of 5 kilograms, the maximum mass of a customer in the chair
must be 148 kg.

Example 2.)

A hydraulic system is used to lift a 2000-kg vehicle in an auto garage. If the vehicle sits
on a piston of area 0.5 square meter, and a force is applied to a piston of area 0.03
square meters, what is the minimum force that must be applied to lift the vehicle?

Answer:
 Archimedes Principle

- States that the upward buoyant force that is exerted on a body immersed in a fluid,
whether fully or partially submerged, is equal to the weight of the fluid that the
body displaces and acts in the upward direction at the center of mass of the displaced
fluid. Archimedes' principle is a law of physics fundamental to fluid mechanics. It was
formulated by Archimedes of Syracuse.

Archimedes of Syracuse - was a Greek mathematician, physicist, engineer, inventor,

and astronomer. Although few details of his life are known, he is regarded as one of the
leading scientists in classical antiquity. Generally considered the greatest
mathematician of antiquity and one of the greatest of all time, Archimedes anticipated
modern calculus and analysis by applying concepts of infinitesimals and the method of
exhaustion to derive and rigorously prove a range of geometrical theorems, including
the area of a circle, the surface area and volume of a sphere, and the area under
a parabola.

Consider a cube immersed in a fluid, with its sides parallel to the direction of gravity.
The fluid will exert a normal force on each face, and therefore only the forces on the top
and bottom faces will contribute to buoyancy. The pressure difference between the
bottom and the top face is directly proportional to the height (difference in depth).
Multiplying the pressure difference by the area of a face gives the net force on the cube
the buoyancy, or the weight of the fluid displaced. By extending this reasoning to
irregular shapes, we can see that, whatever the shape of the submerged body, the
buoyant force is equal to the weight of the fluid displaced.

The weight of the displaced fluid is directly proportional to the volume of the displaced
fluid (if the surrounding fluid is of uniform density). The weight of the object in the fluid is
reduced, because of the force acting on it, which is called upthrust. In simple terms, the
principle states that the buoyant force on an object is equal to the weight of the fluid
displaced by the object, or the density of the fluid multiplied by the submerged volume
times the gravitational constant, g. Thus, among completely submerged objects with
equal masses, objects with greater volume have greater buoyancy.
Suppose a rock's weight is measured as 10 newtons when suspended by a string in
a vacuum with gravity acting on it. Suppose that, when the rock is lowered into water, it
displaces water of weight 3 newtons. The force it then exerts on the string from which it
hangs would be 10 newtons minus the 3 newtons of buoyant force: 10 3 = 7 newtons.
Buoyancy reduces the apparent weight of objects that have sunk completely to the sea
floor. It is generally easier to lift an object up through the water than it is to pull it out of
the water.
For a fully submerged object, Archimedes' principle can be reformulated as follows:
then inserted into the quotient of weights, which has been expanded by the mutual
volume
density of an object = weight
density of fluid weight of displaced fluid

yields the formula below. The density of the immersed object relative to the density of
the fluid can easily be calculated without measuring any volume is

density of an object = weight

density of fluid weight apparent immersed weight

(This formula is used for example in describing the measuring principle of

a dasymeter and of hydrostatic weighing.)

Example: If you drop wood into water, buoyancy will keep it afloat.

Example: A helium balloon in a moving car. When increasing speed or driving in a

curve, the air moves in the opposite direction to the car's acceleration. However, due to
buoyancy, the balloon is pushed "out of the way" by the air, and will actually drift in the
same direction as the car's acceleration.

When an object is immersed in a liquid, the liquid exerts an upward force, which is
known as the buoyant force, that is proportional to the weight of the displaced liquid.
The sum force acting on the object, then, is equal to the difference between the weight
of the object ('down' force) and the weight of displaced liquid ('up' force). Equilibrium, or
neutral buoyancy, is achieved when these two weights (and thus forces) are equal.