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Reprinted by permission of Dick Berg, University of Maryland, for use on this website.

The demonstrations contained and referenced herein are listed for the purposes of cataloging and describing physics demonstrations which should be conducted only under the direction of a trained instructional support professional or physicist. These demonstrations are not presented for the purpose of being conducted by persons unconnected to this Facility and/or persons not consulting with or being supervised by the recognized instructional support professional or physicist and his/her staff. The University is responsible only for those demonstrations carried out using its own equipment using established safety and scheduling policies, and bears no responsibility for those choosing to use this source material for their own purposes. All demonstrations described and contained herein are public domain, and can also be found in reference materials in libraries, bookstores, and electronic sources.

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Connect the Soft Scope to the Caliper Apparatus.  Lower the Calipers into a petri dish with 1/4 in. of water.  Set the scope to the settings that are marked on the card in the Interface bag.  If everything is running right, moving the calipers should show a real-time distance separation on the screen.  This is the speed of sound in water. 

Other rods of Plexiglas, aluminum, brass, or other metals may be placed between the jaws of the calipers.  Essentially the measurement will be the speed of sound through any particular substance.  

NOTE:  This should still be done with the calipers immersed in the water.  You will need the coupling that the water provides between the ultrasonic transducer and the object being measured for accurate measurements.