First Year Physics

[Imran]

First year physics in both semesters is perhaps the best subject u can do-really interesting, lectures are interactive ( we even got to analyse a scene from finding Nemo regardign why the clip was physically incorrect lol).

The textbook of choice is mastering physics and it is a huge textbook as well. I bought an older ediition second hand and got by fine so I don't think u'd need to buy a brand new textbook or anything but u should definitely buy the textbook(it's not that available at libraries as far as i remember-but see if u can get it from the library anyway).

U will need a strong maths base in this subject and fortunately it's nothing like the dumbed down HSC version of physics.

Initially u will do simple mechanics(Newton's laws etc) but in their original forms such as differential equations(very basic ones though as u're in first year). Then u go onto moments of inertia etc and torque that follows pretty much everything in the textbook minus a few stuff-if u're looking to go ahead or anything I'd advise u look through the questions and how to do them-this will help u remember the laws etc u learn in physics and it is in no way like the biology based subjects

[Imran]

PAst papers are also available online and u can have a look through them-on webct they also come with worked answers

(I'll add more later)

[Imran]

Physics isn't a subject where lectopia or recordings are that useful-You have to practice it-cramming won't really help and I would advise going over the tutorial questions and examples in the textbook every week. Doing a few past paper questions will also boost ur confidence. Tutorials are good for asking the tutors hypothetical questions-the tutors tend to be pretty decent and often u can talk to them more freely than the lecturers who may seem a bit "senior"

[Imran]

Mechanics overall is quite simple and haas many similarities with what may have been done regarding circular motion and other 4u math topics from HSC as well as stuff from engineering. U are expected to derive some of the formulae however, especially for things like moments of inertia etc where they may give you objects of strange shapes-such questions often have similarities with volume questions via rotation about axes/lines with a few alterations.

as far as I remember they did provide us with a formula sheet for both semesters so u don't have to memorise but u should understand how the formulae came up

[Imran]

Second semester physics is a lot more exciting and slightly more difficult-both conceptually and mathematically in which there are more derivations. Conceptually it is harder due to the fact they deal with fluid mechanics-bernoulli's law etc fluid mechanics is reputed to be the more difficult field of physics. Furthermore maxwell's equations and electromagnetism is also dealt with in second semester-the derivation of maxwell's equations should be learnt and are popular exam questions-the derivation in this case isn't so much using pure maths but using hypothetical situations and deriving eqautions from that. U'll be expected to integrate over contours for the first time perhaps (this is covered in a lot more detail in real and complex analysis 2nd year).

The electromagnetism part assesses the depth of ur understanding the most and so u should really try to understand every aspect of the lecture in this case.

It also deals with RC circuits, capacitance, inductance etc. U'll finally see why fARADAY'S law is the way it is, including derivation and extensions so it's quite interesting. This part will be new perhaps for some, however u may have covered some of this in the physics olympiad

[Imran]

When uni starts check in the musallah there should be inshallah solutions CDs for the physics textbook mastering physics

[Imran]

Or better still we may have them handed out under supervision so there's enough for everyone

[Rafat]

\begin{spam}

Physics is evil people! Stay away from physics.

\end{spam}

[Imran]

Lol haven't u spent all these years doing physics? I found it pretty interesting but in the interests of my degree I didn't take it in 2nd year-it was one of my better subjects along with maths to be honest.

[Rafat]

I thought if I call it evil it would attract the naughty kids. That would give us more people to play cricket with in the corridors.

[Imran]

I'm up for cricket in any situation inshallah, that's awesome I've finally found another cricket loving person on the forum it seems

[walla]

I done physics at school.. its enjoyable when u understand it..
But I heard uni physics is crazy! :rolleyes:

[Imran]

Oh well it's different that's all, as in it's more abstract and maths oriented but I guess when we first leave school etc we find everything crazy. I'm sure if u liked HSC physics u'll do well and enjoy this too but it's a different way of going about physics here because it is so much more theorectical rather than applied. To be honest we (i certainly was) are apprehensive about alot of uni subjects before doing them but the lecturer's job is to make it seem less crazy-the phys lecturers are good.

It gets crazy in honours year and onwards, my friend and me did a project (we chose it because the name sounded awesome) as part of TSP and it was originally intended for honours so we had to take in maths about 2-3 years ahead of us to understand the stuf. Then we realised it was computer simulation and we were both hopeless with computers.

We had to spend 2 weeks getting our passwoirds(forgetting our passwords as well). It was pretty awesome though, in the meantime we got a lot of spare time-we editted wikipedia alot and we got banned-so don't trust wikipedia all the time

[Imran]

although university of physics is the recommended text, resnick and Halliday as well as giancoli are pretty good alternatives for certain topics

[Imran]

I said I would have copies of the solutions for the mastering physics and place them in the musallah-but the trouble is I don't know how many people are doing physics-perhaps it's better if people just contact me or anyone in the shura so we have an idea of who wants what and then make the solutions