Lab Report: Centripetal Force - Should I Round or Extend?

[melchisio]

lab report--quickie!

im drawing up the graphs for my "centripetal force" lab report by hand, and we are instructed to use sig figs.

problem is, if i use sig figs and round my numbers, the graph's points are in a straight line with one other point that looks like an outlier. It isn't an outlier, and i know what the graph is supposed to look like... my points would follow that exact correlation if i extended the numbers one more digit.

Should i keep my figures rounded, however messed up my graph looks, or should i just leave it and explain the "lack of" trend in my conclusion??

HELP SOON!

 

[dextercioby]

How about mentioning as a source of error.I meam,u know how it looks like with accurate no-s and how it doesn't with the no-s rounded.How about you do it as it should come out (namely precision) and the end of the paper mention the reason for doing it:if u had used less sign.dig-s,your graph would have looked differently,possibly incorrect.

Daniel.

 

[melchisio]

yea thanks, i wouldn't have thought of that. I think it'll work into my report really well!