Question

a silver ball weighing 50g is removed from a furnace and dropped into a 350g of water at 0 degree celcius. if the equilibrium temperature is 10 degree celcius and the specific heat capacity of platinum is 230Jkg-1 degree celcius-1, what is the temperature of the furnace? neglect the effect of the mass of the calorimeter...

Answer 1

This is conservation of energy. We can say that the sum of the energy of the hot ball and the energy of the cool water is the same as the sum of the energy of the ball and water at the equilibrium temperature.

It is convienent to express the energies in terms of enthalpies here. \[\Delta H = m c \Delta T\]The change in enthalpy of the water is expressed as\[\Delta H_W = mc(10-0)\]The change in enthalpy of the ball is expressed as\[\Delta H_B = mc(10-T_i)\]Since energy is conserved, \[\Delta H_W = \Delta H_B\]