Optics B/C

[DivineBbbbbeast]

Dr. Chalker, in the case that the laser beam gets split, what is the policy on which beam will be taken? I heard it was the brightest beam last year, but one competition I attended counted it as a miss because only one beam hit next to the target. can this question be resolved as soon as possible before regionals? Thanks

Unofficially, I'd think the brightest beam should be the one that matters. Does this happen that often in competition? I've never seen it in all the times I've run that event. I have seen an occasional diffraction pattern due to grazing the corner of the mirror, but that's a much different thing and easy to see where the center of the pattern is.

Yes, especially when u have templates like the one our team uses... My best was pretty close to perfect, but one small shift in a mirror on my template can give me a 0 for accuracy. Is it possible to get a clarification on the soinc so that I can show event supervisors in case something goes wrong?

[cngu23]

Can someone explain why when you wear sunglasses inside, you perceive white on the chalkboard as green? And how much information should I include about separate parts of the eye?
And also, this problem? (From the Lake Erie/Niagra Regionals C)

54) Doppler shift for the light of wavelength 6000 Å emitted from the sun is 0.04 Å. If the radius of the sun is 7 x 108 m, then the time period of rotation of the sun will be
a. 30 days
b. 365 days
c. 24 hours
d. 25 days

[foreverphysics]

I'm not exactly sure about the first one...however, I have an experience with something like that.
When I was in the professional city orchestra, I was nine, so I wasn't allowed to play all the symphonies (too much work, according to my teacher). So I played four out of the five symphonies and half the concertos. When I wasn't playing, I was often bored out of my mind. To alleviate my boredom, I would often take random pictures of the room. They all turned out...green. Like, it was completely green-tinted. Then I took my camera and took a few pictures of the adjacent room and they turned out normal, so I know it wasn't my camera.
Maybe green light predominantly filters through lenses in general, especially polarized lenses? I don't know...

[cngu23]

I'm not exactly sure about the first one...however, I have an experience with something like that.
When I was in the professional city orchestra, I was nine, so I wasn't allowed to play all the symphonies (too much work, according to my teacher). So I played four out of the five symphonies and half the concertos. When I wasn't playing, I was often bored out of my mind. To alleviate my boredom, I would often take random pictures of the room. They all turned out...green. Like, it was completely green-tinted. Then I took my camera and took a few pictures of the adjacent room and they turned out normal, so I know it wasn't my camera.
Maybe green light predominantly filters through lenses in general, especially polarized lenses? I don't know...

I think it has to do with tinting(adding white) and shading(adding black) to a color. I'm trying to find a chart.

[chalker]

It happens surprisingly often. For my team between last year and this (counting several invitationals), we have split the laser a total of 4 times that I can remember.

Can you provide more details as to what causes the split? I'm having trouble understanding how the mirrors can cause a true split as opposed to a diffraction type pattern. Are you hitting the corner of the mirror at a very sharp angle or something? Are others having this issue too or is it just your team?

[Schrodingerscat]

Yeah, I have experienced the exact same thing, particularly when the laser beam travels large distances after being reflected at an angle, increasing the result of error, that it strikes the very edge in a way that it hits both the front and side of the mirror and reflects separately.

[chalker]

Yeah, I have experienced the exact same thing, particularly when the laser beam travels large distances after being reflected at an angle, increasing the result of error, that it strikes the very edge in a way that it hits both the front and side of the mirror and reflects separately.

New FAQ: http://soinc.org/node/925

[rfscoach]

Dr. Chalker, in the case that the laser beam gets split, what is the policy on which beam will be taken? I heard it was the brightest beam last year, but one competition I attended counted it as a miss because only one beam hit next to the target. can this question be resolved as soon as possible before regionals? Thanks

Unofficially, I'd think the brightest beam should be the one that matters. Does this happen that often in competition? I've never seen it in all the times I've run that event. I have seen an occasional diffraction pattern due to grazing the corner of the mirror, but that's a much different thing and easy to see where the center of the pattern is.

One of my teams split the beam at Regionals this past Saturday. The brightest beam was 10 mm off the target, the other beam hit the side wall. The ES went with the 10 mm reading.

[foreverphysics]

So...basically they did exactly what the FAQ said to do...

[sarahrutledge]

how much would they take off during the laser shoot if i were to just not be able to do it and leave crying? cause im really stressed and cant figure out how to make templates to help or how to set up the mirrors and such. and im basically alone on this event