Method: Measuring Liquid Volume By Containers

§      METHOD:

MEASURING LIQUID VOLUME BY CONTAINERS

What’s makes difference between volume of solid and volume of liquid? Solids have defined shapes either regular or irregular. If the shape of a solid is regular, then its volume is calculated by geometrical means and if not, it can be figured out indirectly. In any case, the volume is defined in fixed directions.

However, liquids have no definite shape in which occupy the available space of a container. They spread over the entire the area of section and stands up to a height.  Hence the volume of a liquid is the volume of its container up to the height of the liquid level. For this reason, the volumes of hollow shapes are called as ‘capacity’ of the shape. This concept is mainly used in measuring volume of liquid.

One of the methods to measure Volume of Liquid is by using a graduated cylinder (Figure I). It can be used to know the volume of an available liquid. As mentioned earlier, the liquid volume is directly proportional to the height of its container of uniform cross section. Therefore, in a graduated cylinder, the readings are calibrated to directly give the value of the volume.

Figure I: Measuring volume of liquid by graduated cylinder.