Question

A 210 g block is dropped onto a relaxed vertical spring that has a spring constant of k = 2.0 N/cm. The block becomes attached to the spring and compresses the spring 10 cm before momentarily stopping.

Answer 1

Answer:

a) $W_{g}=mdx = 0.21 kg *9.8\frac{m}{s^2} 0.10m=0.2058 J$

b) $W_{spring}= -\frac{1}{2} Kx^2 =-\frac{1}{2} 200 N/m (0.1m)^2=-1 J$

c) $V_i =\sqrt{2 \frac{W_g + W_{spring}}{0.21 kg}}}=\sqrt{2 \frac{(1-0.2058)}{0.21 kg}}}=2.75m/s$

d)  $d_1 =0.183m$ or 18.3 cm

Explanation:

For this case we have the following system with the forces on the figure attached.

We know that the spring compresses a total distance of x=0.10 m

Part a

The gravitational force is defined as mg so on this case the work donde by the gravity is:

$W_{g}=mdx = 0.21 kg *9.8\frac{m}{s^2} 0.10m=0.2058 J$

Part b

For this case first we can convert the spring constant to N/m like this:

$2 \frac{N}{cm} \frac{100cm}{1m}=200 \frac{N}{m}$

And the work donde by the spring on this case is given by:

$W_{spring}= -\frac{1}{2} Kx^2 =-\frac{1}{2} 200 N/m (0.1m)^2=-1 J$

Part c

We can assume that the initial velocity for the block is Vi and is at rest from the end of the movement. If we use balance of energy we got:

$W_{g} +W_{spring} = K_{f} -K_{i}=0- \frac{1}{2} m v^2_i$

And if we solve for the initial velocity we got:

$V_i =\sqrt{2 \frac{W_g + W_{spring}}{0.21 kg}}}=\sqrt{2 \frac{(1-0.2058)}{0.21 kg}}}=2.75m/s$

Part d

Let d1 represent the new maximum distance, in order to find it we know that :

$-1/2mV^2_i = W_g + W_{spring}$

And replacing we got:

$-1/2mV^2_i =mg d_1 -1/2 k d^2_1$

And we can put the terms like this:

$\frac{1}{2} k d^2_1 -mg d_1 -1/2 m V^2_i =0$

If we multiply all the equation by 2 we got:

$k d^2_1 -2 mg d_1 -m V^2_i =0$

Now we can replace the values and we got:

$200N/m d^2_1 -0.21kg(9.8m/s^2)d_1 -0.21 kg(5.50 m/s)^2) =0$

$200 d^2_1 -2.058 d_1 -6.3525=0$

And solving the quadratic equation we got that the solution for $d_1 =0.183m$ or 18.3 cm because the negative solution not make sense.