Electromagnetic induction and Lenz’s law are very important topics in both university
and high school education, as well as in everyday practice. The qualitative demonstration
of Lenz’s law with the movement of a magnetic body falling in a copper tube is well
known. In this work, in order to expand on the quantitative analyses published in
the literature so far, we conducted systematic experiments on the effect of the size
of the copper tube used in the demonstration of Lenz’s law. We established important
quantitative relationships regarding the effect of both the wall thickness and the
inner diameter of the tube, which were also supported by theoretical considerations.
The obtained relationships can not only help university students to understand the
topic more deeply but can also provide engineers with important knowledge in practical
applications and designs. Our low-cost experimental equipment can be easily assembled
in a student laboratory, and we plan to implement this experiment as an advanced university
laboratory activity.
