Chapter 11, Problem 41P

* You are in an open field investigating how sound propagates. You place a rubber balloon 40.0 m away from you and pop the balloon with an air gun while while recording the sound produced by the gun and the popping balloon Figure P11.41 shows your recording represented as a time dependence of the sound amplitude.

(a) Explain what determines the amplitude of each pulse, what determines the time interval between t = 0 (when you triggered the gun) and the first pulse, and what determines the time interval between the pulses.

(b) Can you estimate the speed of the bullet in this experiment based on the given data? Explain your answer.

(c) Draw a new graph that you would expect to get if you repeated the experiment with the balloon 80.0 m away from you. Try to make your prediction as quantitative as possible. Indicate any assumptions that you made.