Oxford PAT 2015

OP

Original post by H.Poulter

What's an average score for the PAT? And what's considered a good score?

The average varies between 50 and 60. If you score slightly above average, you can expect to be called for an interview.
You can find information about each paper in the examiners' reports

(edited 8 years ago)

Reply 22

MintyMilk

3

Original post by ChronicBoredom

Is anyone else struggling to understand the actual questions?? It probably seems silly, but I spend half the paper trying to understand what the question is actually asking of me- the questions are phrased so poorly as well.

I've heard of this being the case for quite a few people, I think it's just something you have to try to get past.

Reply 23

Patrick2810

16

guys do you think we need to know many of these? http://www.h-k.fr/publications/data/adc.ps__annexes.maths.pdf

Reply 24

Anyone know of a good resource for "thermionic emission and accelerated electron beams"? I'm not really sure what level of knowledge they expect us to have here.

Reply 25

Original post by Patrick2810

guys do you think we need to know many of these? http://www.h-k.fr/publications/data/adc.ps__annexes.maths.pdf

We definitely do not. The syllabus makes no mention of it, and it looks too complicated anyway.

Reply 26

OP

Original post by martinsre

Anyone know of a good resource for "thermionic emission and accelerated electron beams"? I'm not really sure what level of knowledge they expect us to have here.

Working principles of an electron gun covers it

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Reply 27

Original post by martinsre

Anyone know of a good resource for "thermionic emission and accelerated electron beams"? I'm not really sure what level of knowledge they expect us to have here.

Hey, have a look at AQA A2 option module, turning points in physics. There is a module explaining it quite well.

Reply 28

Thanks, I'll look into it.

Could you be so kind, as to explain what is happening in #14 b of your PAT 2015 Specimen Solutions? I'm really stuck here.

Reply 29

Original post by Crazecatlady

Hey, have a look at AQA A2 option module, turning points in physics. There is a module explaining it quite well.

This looks great! Thanks.

Reply 30

Original post by mickel_w

can someone explain q19 on the 2012 paper? Ive seen the answers but I dont understand it :frown:

Hey, if you look at the path difference of the two waves, the one that goes to the right (towards the screen) and to the left (towards the microphone), you will see that:
Distance traveled by wave (towards the microphone): ML
Distance traveled by wave (towards the screen) :LS +LS +ML

I am including the distance traveled by the wave as it bounced off the screen (LS +ML), until it reached the microphone (M)
The path difference between the two is: 2LS +ML - ML = 2LS
In order for there to be maximas and minimas, the path difference has to change. You can see that the distance between the microphone and the loudspeaker (ML) won't affect the the path difference, while the distance from the loudspeaker to the screen (LS) will affect the path difference. Hence, if the loudspeaker is moved, the microphone will detect maxima and minima, but if the microphone is moved, path difference won't chance and hence it won't be detecting maximas/minimas.

Hope this helps a bit, it's slightly confusing!

Reply 31

OP

Original post by martinsre

Thanks, I'll look into it.

Could you be so kind, as to explain what is happening in #14 b of your PAT 2015 Specimen Solutions? I'm really stuck here.

You first need to find the linear speed at which the reel rotates. Since three strings pull up the load, rotation speed must be three times u. Then use v=wr

Reply 32

OP

Original post by mickel_w

can someone explain q19 on the 2012 paper? Ive seen the answers but I dont understand it :frown:

Have a look at this:

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Reply 33

Original post by Crazecatlady

Hey, have a look at AQA A2 option module, turning points in physics. There is a module explaining it quite well.

So in essence, all I need to know about accelerated electron beams, is eV=1/2mv^2, and how an electron behaves in a magnetic field?

As for thermionic emission, just the fact that you can have a metal (cathode) emit electrons or ions by heating it?

Thanks,

M.

Reply 34

Patrick2810

16

https://i.gyazo.com/333fbf59cfaead7cdc8bb4f89af6de63.png is this c4? Starting to get annoyed now......

Reply 35

^978AABE638EC6A09F8840E5EFC5F4D244E08046EB71912E84A^pimgpsh_fullsize_distr.jpg339.7KB

Original post by martinsre

So in essence, all I need to know about accelerated electron beams, is eV=1/2mv^2, and how an electron behaves in a magnetic field?

As for thermionic emission, just the fact that you can have a metal (cathode) emit electrons or ions by heating it?

Thanks,

M.

Yeah, that's as far as I know. Just to be safe, have a look at the AQA A2 formulas for turning points and memorise them. In fact, just memorise all A2 and As formulas! I've stumbled upon questions in the 2012 PAT that required formulas for radioactive decay and gas pressure, as well as molar mass and the atomic numbers for oxygen and carbon. The entire 2012 paper was hell, to be honest.

Reply 36

MintyMilk

3

Original post by Patrick2810

https://i.gyazo.com/333fbf59cfaead7cdc8bb4f89af6de63.png is this c4? Starting to get annoyed now......

http://prntscr.com/8vkkav
If partial fractions are C4, then I guess so.

There must be another way of doing it though. The attachment is another way of solving 3 ii) in the 2014 paper without partial fractions that a friend figured out.

Might still be worth learning partial fractions anyway though, could someone verify whether this would be necessary?

Reply 37

Original post by Patrick2810

guys do you think we need to know many of these? http://www.h-k.fr/publications/data/adc.ps__annexes.maths.pdf

Hey, you need to know the derivatives and compound angle formulas, ideally. You don't need sinh, cosh or tanh relationships, you don't need to memorise any integration since most of is pretty basic; have a look at integration by recognition, there is a lot of it in PAT.
I don't think Taylor or Maclaurin series will be asked, as long as you understand binomial expansion you should be safe. Have a look at the link below, it's the syllabus for PAT. Hope it helps!

https://www2.physics.ox.ac.uk/study-here/undergraduates/applications/physics-aptitude-test-pat/pat-syllabus

Reply 38

Original post by MintyMilk

http://prntscr.com/8vkkav
If partial fractions are C4, then I guess so.

There must be another way of doing it though. The attachment is another way of solving 3 ii) in the 2014 paper without partial fractions that a friend figured out.

Might still be worth learning partial fractions anyway though, could someone verify whether this would be necessary?

The method looks right, since you got the right answer then it must be right. I would highly recommend for you to learn partial fractions, they will save you a lot of time. You don't want to waste 10 min on finding one integral. A lot of things are in the papers but are not actually on the syllabus, which is really frustrating :frown:

Reply 39