Archimedes's Principle

Archimedes's principle states that an object immersed in a liquid will be supported by a pressure equal to the
weight of the liquid displaced by the object. This is caused by an equilibrium of forces. The two forces seeking
equilibrium are gravity and pressure from the surrounding liquid. Gravity pulls the object down through the liquid.
The pressure of the surrounding liquid is resisting the free fall of the immersed object. The degree to which the
weight of the object corresponds to the weight of the displaced liquid determines whether the object sinks quickly or
slowly or floats. The intensity of the pressure is in direct relationship to the depth.

A cubic foot of water weighs 62.4 lb (28.3 kg). Therefore, if an object placed in water has a volume of a cubic foot
and weighs more than 62.4 lb, it will sink. Rocks sink because most rocks have a greater mass than water (except
pumice). A block of wood will likely float in water because most wood has a mass less than 62.4 lb per cubic foot. If
an object has a mass exactly 62.4 lb per cubic foot, weighing exactly the same as the water it displaces, it will
neither sink nor float but remain suspended where it is placed.

The story of the discovery of the principle is apocryphal; however it is a good example of an application of
the principle. Archimedes lived in the Greek city-state of Syracuse on the island of Sicily about 200 B.C. and was
friends with the king, Heron. As the story goes, Heron suspected that his crown was not pure gold but gilded silver.
He asked Archimedes to determine if the crown was truly gold or mostly silver. Archimedes thought of the problem
while he stepped into a full bath. As the water ran over the sides of the tub, he realized the solution. He immediately
ran to Heron's house, through the streets of Syracuse, naked, yelling "Eureka", which means "I found it".

Archimedes realized that he could determine the volume of the crown by placing it in water and measuring the
amount of displaced water. Since the mass of gold and the mass of silver were already known, he would need only
to multiply the calculated volume of the crown by its weight. The result was then compared to the known mass of
gold and silver. Another way the principle could be used to determine the substance of an object is to weigh the
object before placing it in water and again while it is in the container of water. Determine the difference in the
weight of the object outside of water and the weight of the object when submerged. The ratio of that difference to
the weight outside the water should equal the ratio of the mass of water to the mass of the substance. Using the
crown as an example again, the ratio of the mass of gold to the mass of water is 1/18. The submerged crown would
be expected to weigh 17/18 as much as the crown outside of water, if it was indeed gold.

The Archimedes' Principle

There is a widely known tale about Archimedes, which tells about the method he devised to determine the volume
of an irregular shaped object. Once while taking a bath, he had noticed that the level of water in the tub rose as he
got in. The story goes on that a new crown was made for King Hiero II, and Archimedes was asked to check if the
crown was made of solid gold, or if some silver had been added by the goldsmith. He was also asked to solve the
problem without damaging the crown. This is when he decided to use the discovery he had made in his bath; that
later came to be known as the Archimedes' principle. The Archimedes' principle states that a body immersed in
fluid experiences a buoyant force equal to the weight of the liquid displaced. He realized that this could be put to
use, while determining the volume of the crown. To solve the quandary set before him by the king, he simply
divided the weight of crown by the water displaced by it.

bulk density is a property of powders, granules and other "divided" solids, especially used in reference to soil. It is
defined as the mass of many particles of the material divided by the total volume they occupy. The total volume
includes particle volume, inter-particle void volume and internal pore volume. [1]
Bulk density is not an intrinsic property of a material; it can change depending on how the material is handled. For
example, a powder poured in to a cylinder will have a particular bulk density; if the cylinder is disturbed, the powder
particles will move and usually settle closer together, resulting in a higher bulk density. For this reason, the bulk
density of powders is usually reported both as "freely settled" and "tapped" density (where the tapped density refers
to the bulk density of the powder after a specified compaction process, usually involving vibration of the container.)

Soil

The bulk density of soil depends greatly on the mineral make up of soil and the degree of compaction. The density
of quartz is around 2.65g/cm³ but the bulk density of a mineral soil is normally about half that density, between 1.0
and 1.6g/cm³. Soils high in organics and some friable clay may have a bulk density well below 1g/cm³

Bulk density of soil is usually determined on Core samples which are taken by driving a metal corer into the soil at
the desired depth and horizon. The samples are then oven dried and weighed.

Bulk density = mass of oven dry soil/core volume

The bulk density of soil is inversely related to the porosity of the same soil: the more pore space in a soil the lower
the value for bulk density. Bulk density of a region in the interior of the earth is also related to the seismic velocity
of waves travelling through it: for P-waves, this has been quantified with Gardner's relation. The higher the density,
the faster the velocity.