In a collision that is not perfectly elastic, what happens to the mechanical energy of the system?
1 answer:
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(a) -2451 N
We can start by calculating the acceleration of the car. We have:
is the initial velocity
v = 0 is the final velocity of the car
d = 125 m is the stopping distance
So we can use the following equation
To find the acceleration of the car, a:
Now we can use Newton's second Law:
F = ma
where m = 1100 kg to find the force exerted on the car in order to stop it; we find:
and the negative sign means the force is in the opposite direction to the motion of the car.
(b)
We can use again the equation
To find the acceleration of the car. This time we have
is the initial velocity
v = 0 is the final velocity of the car
d = 2.0 m is the stopping distance
Substituting and solving for a,
So now we can find the force exerted on the car by using again Newton's second law:
As we can see, the force is much stronger than the force exerted in part a).