Ask a Question
or
Create a Poll
  1. Home /
  2. Questions /
  3. Transportation
  4. / Ships And Boats

by SteponQuest on February 28th, 2007

SteponQuest

Question

Help answer this question below.

What's the best way to weigh something without a scale?

Share:
Other

Answers. Showing one answer.

  • by scubabob on February 28th, 2007

    scubabob

    I'm sure it's not the "best", but you can use water displacement if the object floats. The mass of water the object displaces in a container is equal to it's own mass. One US gallon equals 8.33 pounds , so to keep it simple, if the object displaces one US gallon, it weighs 8.33 pounds, 2 gallons equals 16.66 pounds and so on.
    This is the method they use to calculate a ships mass. The interior of the hull volume to the water line plus whatever hull plate thickness will give you the ships mass. That's the reasoning behind using the term displacement when referring to a ship's weight.

    Comments

    • I really love your answer, but I think there is more.

      You mean if I put 1 inch diameter steel shot then replaced it with 1 inch diameter glass marble they would displace different amounts of water? Seems like I would need to set each off these marbles in a small boat to get a good displacement measure.

      SteponQuest

      by SteponQuest on March 2nd, 2007

    • Ahh..but then you're not using mass, you're using volume. The volume only comes into play if the object is floating here. I could take a volume of feathers and the same volume of iron. If they're floating, you'd get different displacements. If they're sunk, they'll produce the same displacement.

      scubabob

      by scubabob on March 2nd, 2007

    • Water displacement is used to find volume, not mass. The problem with your method is that you are failing to account for density. Whether the object floats or not does matter either; as long as it is submerged in the water, it will displace the same amount of water.

      Now, if the density of what you're trying to weigh is the same as the density of water (1 g/cm^3), then water displacement will find you the mass.

      phosgene

      by phosgene on September 7th, 2011

    • Like
    • Report

    3 comments | Post one | Permalink

Want to attach an image to your answer? Click here.

Did this answer your question? If not, then ask a new question or create a poll.

More Questions. Additional questions in this category.

You're reading What's the best way to weigh something without a scale?

Follow us on Facebook!

Related Ads

Related Questions

Professionally Researched

Answerbag

a Demand Media company