Sonic Ranger in Water: Will it Track Ball Velocity?

[silentstorm]

i was wondering if a sonic ranger works fine if a ball were dropped in a viscous medium, say water, instead of air. Will it still be able to track the motion of the ball and give me the velocity-time graph?

 

[dst]

Depends on how it works but your transmitter/reciever would have to be in the water as well, presumably. Otherwise since the speed of sound in water is different from air, you'll have some sort of error (but that should be easily calculated). You'll get a relative speed/time graph with some sort of conversion factor (using the ranger outside water).

 

[silentstorm]

thanks, actually my idea was to use this concept to devise an experiment to deduce the relationship between drag force and velocity. do you think it will work (after the error calculation that is..)?