Mechanics

Mechanics
2.1

2.2
Kinematics

Forces and Dynamics 2

CORE
2.3 Work, Energy and Power

2.4 Uniform Circular motion

TOK Background

T he late Richard Feynman described the process of Physics as akin to observing a vast chess game in which the
boundaries of the chessboard cannot be seen. Furthermore, we have no idea why the game is being played or by
whom. Nor do we know when the game started, nor will we ever see the end of the game. We don’t know the rules of the
game and our problem is to figure them out. By careful observation over a period of time we might, for example, discover
the rule that governs the move of the bishops and if we are really clever we might even find the rule which governs the
movement of the knights. Occasionally something really odd might happen like two white queens appearing on the
board at the same time. All our subsequent observations had led us to the conclusion that this could not be the case.

The chessboard in this analogy is the Universe and the chess pieces are the matter in the Universe. The rules that we
discover are the laws of Physics and the observation we make of the pieces are the experiments that we carry out to
establish the laws of Physics. The rules give the “how” and not the “why”. In other words they do not tell us why the
pieces move but they help us understand the manner in which they move. And so it is with Physics. We will never know
for example, why when we push something it moves. However, we can give a very good description of how it will move
under different circumstances. Physics is the science that describes how the Universe “works”.

Physics falls into two main categories. There is the Physics before 1926 – Classical Physics – and there is the Physics after
1926- Quantum Physics. Most of the Physics that is studied in an IB course is Classical Physics. However, it is important
to realise that ultimately our description of how the Universe works must be understood in terms of Quantum Physics
because we know this to be (so far.) the “correct Physics”. So you might ask why do we spend so much time in teaching
you the “wrong” Physics? Well, it’s not quite as bad as it sounds. For example, if we apply the laws of Classical Physics
to the behaviour of electrons in solids we get the wrong answer. The laws of Quantum Physics give the right answer. On
the other hand if we apply the laws of Classical Physics and the laws of Quantum Physics to the behaviour of billiard
balls both give the right answer. However, using Quantum Physics in this situation is rather like taking the proverbial
sledgehammer to crack a walnut. In many of the situations that we encounter, Classical Physics will give us the right
answer and so for this reason, and the fact that Quantum Physics is not easy to grasp on first acquaintance, we spend a
lot of time teaching students Classical Physics.

If we “plot” the speed of things against size, then we can see the sort of areas pertinent to each of the main areas of
Physics. Refer to Figure 201.

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 Chapter 2

Physics

Relativity and Thermodynamics

D.13, H 3, 8,10
CORE

Classical Physics Quantum Physics

Newtonian Mechanics Electromagnetism QED

Quantum mechanics
(mass) (charge) J.1
7, 13, F, D.4-5, E, J
1, 2, 4. 6.1, 8, 9.1-2-4
--

Electrostatics Magnetostatics Electromagnetism

(charge at rest) (charge in uniform (charge in accelerated
5.1, 6.2, 9.3 motion) 6.3 motion) 12 A 4-6, G

Figure 202 The structure of this course

Physics. The latter is discussed in more detail in Topic D.1

108 Relativistic Physics and D.2 and Option H.

The two great “pillars” upon which Classical Physics rests

are Newtonian Mechanics and Electromagnetism. Mass
106 and electric charge are the two basic properties that we
associate with all matter and Newtonian mechanics
essentially deals with mass and electromagnetism
Speed (ms–1)

essentially deals with charge. The two corresponding

104 Quantum Classical
Physics Physics pillars upon which Quantum Mechanics rest are Quantum
Mechanics and Quantum Electrodynamics. Bridging both
Quantum and Classical Physics is Relativistic Physics and
Thermodynamics. This latter subject essentially deals
102
with the relationship between heat and work and also
such interesting questions as “how can order arise from
disorder?”

10–15 10–10 10–5 100 105 1010

The Figure 202 summarises the essential branches of
Size (m) Physics and also gives the appropriate syllabus reference
in the IB Physics Syllabus.
Figure 201 The different areas of Physics
In the present time we actually understand the two
You will note that there is a region that overlaps both great pillars of Physics to be General Relativity (which
Quantum and Classical Physics. This is Relativistic Physics describes space and time) and Quantum Physics (which
and is the Physics we have to use when we are dealing describes everything else.) and somewhere along the line
with speeds close to that of the speed of light. So there Thermodynamics has to fit in as well. One of the great
is Relativistic Quantum Physics and Relativistic Classical aims of physicists is to try and “unify” General relativity
and Quantum Mechanics into a single theory.

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 Mechanics

NEWTONIAN MECHANICS
In this part of the course we start our journey through
Newtonian Mechanics, one of the great pillars of Classical 2.1.1 Define displacement, velocity, speed and
Physics. The essential problem in Mechanics is this: if at acceleration.
any given instant in time we know the positions and velocities

CORE
of all the particles that make up a particular system can we 2.1.2 Explain the difference between
predict the future position and velocities of all the particles? instantaneous and average values of
speed, of velocity and of acceleration.
This is the mechanics problem in its most general form.
Specific examples are problems such as predicting solar 2.1.3 Outline the conditions under which the
eclipses, putting satellites into orbit, finding out how the equations for uniformly accelerated
positions of an oscillating object varies with time and motion may be applied.
finding out where a snooker ball ends up when it struck
by another snooker ball. 2.1.4 Identify the acceleration of a body falling
in a vacuum near the Earth’s surface with
In 1687, Isaac Newton (1642-1727) published his Principia the acceleration g of free fall.
Mathematica in which he set out a method for solving
these type of problems; hence the name ‘Newtonian 2.1.5 Solve problems involving the equations of
Mechanics’. uniformly accelerated motion

Describe the effects of air resistance on

2.1 Kinematics
2.1.6
falling objects.

Introduction 2.1.7 Draw and analyse distance–time graphs,

displacement–time graphs, velocity–time
Before we can solve such problems as outlined above we graphs and acceleration–time graphs.
need some method of describing quantitatively the motion
of particles. 2.1.8 Calculate and interpret the slopes of
displacement–time graphs and velocity–
Note. The terms quantitative and qualitative are used a time graphs, and the areas under velocity–
lot in Physics and it is well to be clear as to their meaning. time graphs and acceleration–time graphs.
Suppose that the motion of something was described as
follows - “ it got faster and faster and then suddenly came 2.1.9 Determine relative velocity in one and in
to an abrupt stop a long way from where it started”. This two dimensions.
© IBO 2007
would be a qualitative description of the motion. On the
other hand if I describe the motion as follows - “It started
from rest and headed due north with a positive acceleration,
-2 -1
2.1.1 Displacement, velocity,
of 15 m s for 20 s, reaching a velocity of 300 m s . After speed and acceleration
-2
20 s it acquired a negative acceleration of 50 ms again in a
Northerly direction and came to rest having a displacement
3.9 km due North from where it started.” This is then a Displacement is a measured distance in a given direction.
quantitative description of the motion. In this respect it tells us not only the distance of an object
from a particular reference point but also the direction
The key words in the above quantitative description are from the reference point. So displacement is a vector
displacement, velocity and acceleration so let us look at quantity. In many situations we will often measure the
these so-called kinematic concepts in more detail. displacement from the origin of a Cartesian co-ordinate
system and the displacement of a particle can be simply
given as the co-ordinates of a point (x, y, z). (Strictly
speaking the displacement should be written as a matrix
[x, y, z] but that need not concern us here since in most
instances in this chapter we will usually restrict ourselves
to displacement in the x-direction only).

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 Chapter 2

y y A 100 m due East

B 100 m__due West
C 100​√__
2 ​m South East
D 100​√2 ​m South West
P P

(4,0) x (8,0) x Speed

CORE

Figure 203 One method of calculating displacement This is a concept with which you will all be familiar. In its
simplest form speed just tells us the rate at which a moving
(3,5) object covers distance. Hence we have

distance
A–B speed = -------------------
time
B

(6,2) Velocity
A Velocity is speed in a given direction. It is therefore a vector
quantity. To plot a course an airline pilot needs to know
not just the speed of the wind but from which direction it
Figure 204 Another method of calculating displacement is blowing. The wind velocity must be known.

Figures 203 and 204 are two examples of calculating

displacements. In Figure 203 the particle P is at the point
(4,0) at some instant and at a certain time later it is at a point Example
(8,0). Its displacement thereforein this time interval is 4 units
in the positive x direction.
In still water a motor boat has a maximum speed of
In Figure 204, the particle is at the point (6, 2) at some instant 5 m s-1. The boat sets off to cross from one bank of a river
and its displacement from the origin is represented by the to the other. The river flows with a speed of 2 m s-1 and
vector A. At some interval later the particle has moved to the motor boat engine is set to maximum. Calculate the
the point (3, 5) and its displacement is represented by vector velocity of the motor boat.
B. Its displacement in this time interval is therefore B - A .
The solution to this problem involves simple vector addition.

Exercise

A racing car travels round a circular track of radius 100 m

as shown in the diagram below. Resultant velocity of
A the boat
5
O

100 m

2
P
100 m

With reference to the above diagram the magnitude of

the resultant velocity of the boat is

2 2
5 + 2 = 5.4 m s–1.
The car starts at O. When it has travelled to P its
displacement as measured from O is

34
2
((
α = tan–1 --- = 21.8° ( = 22°).
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 Mechanics
2 2
5 + 2 = 5.4 m s–1.
The direction can be measured relative to the original An experiment with free fall can help us understand this.
direction of the boat and is given by Figure 207 shows a ball being dropped between two light
gates which are connected to an electronic counter.
the angle α = tan
–1
( 2--5-( = 21.8° ( = 22°).
Acceleration
A

CORE
Acceleration is the rate of change of velocity in a given
direction. (Change in velocity ÷ time taken). In the SI
system the unit is metres per second per second. i.e. the
change in velocity measured in m s-1 every second. We
s
write this as m s-2. Since we define acceleration in terms
of velocity it is therefore a vector quantity. It is important counter
to understand that the word ‘deceleration’ has no place in
physics. If the acceleration of an object is positive then we
understand its rate of change of velocity to be positive and B
it could mean that the speed of the body is increasing. A
body that is slowing down will have a negative acceleration. Figure 207 An experiment in free fall
However, do not think of acceleration as a ‘slowing up’ or
‘getting faster’. If a car for example goes round a bend in The ball is dropped from a point somewhere above the
the road at constant speed it is accelerating. Why? Because light gate A. The two light gates A and B connected to the
the direction of the car is changing and therefore its counter will record the time t that it takes the ball to fall the
velocity is changing. If its velocity is changing then it must distance s. The average speed of the ball as it falls between A
s
have acceleration. This is sometimes difficult for people and B is just -t . ��������������������������������������������������
The ball is of course accelerating as it falls so
to grasp when they first meet the physics definition of its speed is changing. What we do now is to move the light
acceleration because in everyday usage acceleration refers gate B closer to A and repeat the experiment. We obtain
to something getting faster. Similarly words like work and a different value for the average velocity. As we repeat the
power which can have very flexible meanings in everyday experiment several times, each time moving B closer to A,
usage are very precisely defined in physics. So beware. we will find that the values of the average speed obtained
each time will be approaching some limiting value. This
As we shall see later on in this chapter it is very important value is actually the instantaneous speed of the ball as it
to keep in mind the vector nature of both velocity and passes A. When the distance between A and B becomes
acceleration. very small (as does the corresponding time of fall) then
this distance divided by the time will very nearly be equal
to the instantaneous speed at A.
2.1.2 Instantaneous and average
values If we let the small distance equal ∆s and the time of fall
equal ∆t then the average speed vav over this distance is

If you travel by car between two towns a distance of ​ ∆s​

​v​av​= ___
∆t
200 km apart and your journey time is 4 hours your
average speed would be 50 km hr-1. Clearly this does not and the instantaneous speed v is given by
mean that every time that you look at the speedometer
it would be reading 50 km h-1. Indeed for some of the v =    ​ ∆s​ ​ 
​ lim ​___
∆t → 0 ∆t
journey you could well have been having a cup of coffee
at a service station. This raises the question of what does ​ ∆s​ as ∆t → 0
or v = ___
∆t
the reading on the speedometer actually mean. On a very
simplistic level it tells us that if we maintain this speed (For those of you who do calculus you will recognise this as
then in one hour we will cover a distance of 50 km. At
another level it tells us that at that particular instant the ds​as ∆t → zero.)
the derivative __
dt
car has an instantaneous speed of 50 km h-1.
distance
speed is= ------------------- so what do we mean by an ∆s
But speed time v = ------ as ∆t → 0
∆t
instantaneous speed?

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 Chapter 2

If we are dealing with velocities then we must write the v

above equation in vector form

The magnitude of instantaneous velocity is the instantaneous v=V

speed of the object at the instant measured and the direction
of the velocity is the direction in which the object is moving
at that instant. The concept of instantaneous acceleration
CORE

follows accordingly as

∆v
a = ------ as ∆t → 0
∆t
0
Where ∆v is the change in velocity in time ∆t. t=T t

Figure 208 Variation Of Time With Speed

2.1.3 The equations of uniformly
accelerated motion Since distance = speed × time, the distance travelled is the
area under the speed-time graph. If the body starts from
rest, then the distance s travelled in a time t = T is s = -₂¹ vT
Throughout most of the course we will deal with constant where v is the speed at time T.
accelerations and you will not be expected to solve
problems which involve non-uniform accelerations. From the definition of acceleration, we have a = v/t, hence
s = -₂¹ aT2. In general, the distance s travelled in any arbitary
For objects moving with constant acceleration in a straight time t is therefore s = -₂¹ at2. If the body starts with speed u,
line there is a set of three very useful equations which then clearly we have to add the 12 2 area ut such that
1 extra
relate displacement, velocity, acceleration and time s =s ut + ---+at--- at
= ut
1--- 2and 2 2
we will now derive these. s = ut + at 1 2
2 s = ut + --- at
2
The equations only relate magnitudes and therefore we
v –v----------
u– u
will write the symbols in the equations in scalar form. We can eliminate the time from this equation by substituting t =t =
----------- -
v–u a a
in t = ----------- from the first equation such that v–u
Let a t = -----------
2
a
v----------
–---------- u – 2u
vu– u-1 1---v –v-----------
s =s u= ×u × - + ---+a -----------
a
t = the time for which the body acceleratesv–u 1 v–u 2 a a 2 2 a a 2
s = u × ----------- + --- a ----------- v–u 1 v–u
a 2 a s = u × ----------- + --- a -----------
a = acceleration If we expand the brackets and a collect
2 upa terms then we
see that
u = the speed at time t = 0, the initial speed
2 2 2 2
2 2
v v= = u u+ 2as + 2as
v = u + 2as
v = the speed after time t, the final speed 2 2
This is the third equation v =foru the + 2as
set.
s = the distance travelled in time t

The first equation is just the definition of acceleration. If 2.1.4 Acceleration of free fall
a body starts from rest then its speed after a time t will be
given by v = at. If its initial speed is u then clearly, We have already alluded to the acceleration of free fall
(or acceleration due to gravity) above. This, as we have
v = u + at seen, can be measured by placing two light gates a vertical
distance apart. The velocity of a falling object as it passes
The sketch-graph in Figure 208 shows the variation with each of the gates is then calculated using the equation
time t of the speed v of a body moving with constant s = -₂¹ at2.
acceleration a.

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 Mechanics

Another way is to take a strobe photograph of a falling If you carry out an experiment to measure g and obtain
object against the background of a measuring stick as a value say of 9.4 m s–2 then make sure that you calculate
described previously. your error using the correct method. For example do not
assume that the value of g is 9.8 m s–2 and hence compute
The following exercise demonstrates an alternative way your error in measurement as ± 4 %. You do not know
of analysing data obtained using strobe photographic what the value of g is at your location and that is why you
techniques. This method is based on the equations of are measuring it. One correct way to calculate the error is

CORE
uniform motion. along the lines indicated in the preceeding exercise, i.e.,
using error bars.
Figure 209 shows the results of an experiment in which
the strobe photograph of a falling ball has been analysed.
The strobe takes 20 pictures a second. The time between 2.1.5 Solve problems involving
each picture is therefore 0.05 s. The distance column is the the equations of uniformly
measured distance between each successive photograph of
the ball. The error in the distance has been estimated from accelerated motion
parallax error in reading from the scale against which
the photographs have been taken and also in locating the
centre of the ball in each photograph. Exercise 2.4

You are to plot a graph of s against t2 and from the graph

find a value of g. You should include error bars on the 1. A stone is dropped down a well and a splash is
graph and use these to calculate the error in the value of g heard 2.4 s later. Determine the distance from the
that you have determined. top of the well to the surface of the water?

time t/s ±0.01/s distance s/cm ±0.4 cm 2. A girl stands on the edge of a vertical cliff and
0 0 she throws a stone vertically upwards. The stone
0.05 1.2 eventually lands in the sea below her. The stone
0.10 4.8 leaves her hand with a speed of 15 m s-1 and the
0.15 10.9 height of the cliff is 25 m.
0.20 19.4
0.25 30.3 Calculate
0.30 43.7
i. the maximum height reached by the stone.
0.35 59.4
ii. the time to reach the maximum height.
0.40 77.6 iii. the speed with which the stone hits the sea.
0.45 98.2 iv. the time from leaving the girl’s hand that it
0.50 121.2 takes the stone to hit the sea.
0.55 146.7
0.60 174.6 3. A sprinter starts off down a track at a speed of
10 m s-1. At the same time a cyclist also starts
Figure 209 Data For Free Fall off down the track. The cyclist accelerates to
a top speed of 20 m s-1 in 4.0 s. Ignoring the
Some comments on g acceleration of the sprinter, determine the distance
from the start that the cyclist will pass the sprinter.
As mentioned above the value of g varies with position
and with height above the Earth’s surface. In the absence
of air resistance the acceleration of free falling objects
is independent of their mass. This was first noted by
Galileo who is reputed to have timed the duration of
fall for different objects dropped from the top of the
Leaning Tower of Pisa. The fact that the acceleration of
free fall is independent of an object’s mass has far reaching
significance in Physics and is discussed in more detail in
“Topic H. (General relativity)”

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 Chapter 2

2.1.6 The effect of air resistance A

velocity
E
So far in this discussion of motion we have ignored the G
B D
effects of air resistance. When an object moves though O time
the air, it is subjected to a retarding force and this force H
can be very complicated particularly if the object moves at C
F
CORE

high speed. The force will also depend on the shape of the
object and its mass. Think of the way in which a feather
floats to Earth compared to the way in which a stone falls. Figure 210 Changes of velocity with time
However, for spherical objects moving at relatively low
speeds, experiment shows that the retarding force due to The ball leaves the hand at point O and accelerates
air resistance, sometimes referred to as the drag force, is uniformly until it hits the ground at A. At A it undergoes
directly proportional to the speed of the object (provided a large acceleration during which its velocity changes
that the density of the air stays constant). Effectively this from positive to negative (being zero at B). The change in
means that as the object moves faster and faster, the drag velocity between B and C is less than the change in velocity
force gets greater and greater until in fact it reaches a value between A and B since the rebound velocity is lower than
equal to the value of the force accelerating the object. the impact velocity. The ball accelerates from C to D at
When this occurs the object will no longer accelerate and which point it is at its maximum height and its velocity
will move with constant velocity. (We will discuss the is zero. Notice that even though its velocity is zero its
effect of forces on the motion of objects in much more acceleration is not. The ball now falls back to the surface
detail in the next section). The constant velocity that the and hits the surface at point E. Neglecting air resistance
object attains is called the terminal velocity. If a stone the velocity of the ball at points C, and E will be the same.
is dropped from a balloon that is at a height of 5000 m, The process now repeats.
then, if we ignore air resistance, the velocity with which it
strikes the ground is about 320 m s-1 (about the speed of The lines OA, CE and FG are parallel and the gradient of
sound). Because of air resistance the actual speed is much these lines is the acceleration of free fall.g.
less than this. For example if you fell out of the balloon,
your terminal velocity would be about 60 m s-1. Still not a The lines AC, EF and GH are also parallel and the gradient
very comfortable speed with which to strike the ground. of these lines is equal to the acceleration of the ball whilst
it is in contact with the surface. The lines should not be
Exercise 2 on page 39 will help you become familiar with vertical as this would mean that the acceleration would
the idea of terminal velocity. be infinite.

The acceleration of the ball at points such as A, C and E is

2.1.7 Graphical representation not equal to g.
of motion
Sketching an acceleration–time graph taking into account
the acceleration of the ball whilst it is in contact with the
A very useful way to describe the motion of an object surface is a little tricky however, you might like to try it
is to sketch a graph of its kinematics properties. This is as an exercise. For all other parts of the ball’s motion it
best illustrated by means of an example. Consider the has a constant acceleration, g. The speed-time graph is
subsequent motion of a hard rubber ball that is dropped interesting and this is left as a question at the end of the
onto a hard surface. The ball accelerates uniformly under chapter.
gravity. On each impact with the surface it will lose some
energy such that after several bounces it will come to rest. The displacement–time graph is also interesting and this
After each successive bounce it will leave the ground with is also left as a question at the end of the chapter.
reduced speed and reach a reduced maximum height. On
the way down to the surface it speeds up and on leaving
the surface it slows down.

The graph in Figure 210 shows how we can best represent

how the velocity changes with time i.e., the velocity–time
graph.

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 Mechanics

Exercise 2.2 120

100

1. A ‘glider’ bounces backwards and forwards 80

distance / m
between the ‘buffers’ of a linear air- track.
Neglecting friction, which one of the graphs below 60

CORE
best represents how the
40

(a) velocity,
20
(b) acceleration,
(c) displacement and 0
(d) speed 0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 time / s

of the glider varies with time? Figure 212 Distance-time displacement graph

A. B. If the speed is not constant we can still find average speeds

and instantaneous speeds from displacement–time graphs.
time time
To demonstrate this, let us look at the distance–time graph
for a falling ball this is shown in Figure 213.

C. D.
6

time time 5

4
distance / m

2. For the example of the stone dropped from a 3

balloon and striking the ground and taking into
account air resistance sketch 2
1.8
1
i. a distance–time graph.
ii. a velocity–time graph. 0.4
0
iii. an acceleration–time graph. 0 0.2 0.4 0. 6 0.8 1.0 1.2 1.4 time / s

Figure 213 Distance- time displacementfor a falling ball

2.1.8 Analysis of motion graphs
From the graph we see that the time it takes the ball to
A distance-time graph will help us to understand the fall 1.0 m is 0.4 s. The average speed over this distance is
concept of instantaneous speed (or velocity). therefore 2.5 m s-1.

Consider the distance-time graph of an object moving To find say the instantaneous speed at 1.0 m we find the
with constant speed as shown in Figure 212 gradient of the curve at this point.

In this situation equal distances are covered in equal times To do this we draw the tangent to the point as shown.
and clearly the velocity (speed) is equal to the gradient of From the tangent that is drawn, we see that the slope of
the graph – in this case, 10 m s-1. The average speed is the line is 1.8 (= ∆s) divided by 0.4 (= ∆t) = 4.5 m s-1
equal to the instantaneous speed at all points.

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 Chapter 2

This is actually what we mean when we write an

instantaneous speed as 10

vP = ∆ s- as ∆t → 0 9
-----

–1
8
∆t

velocity (speed) / m s
7
∆ s-
vP = ∆ s- as ∆t → 0
vP = ∆ s- as ∆t → 0
6
----- vP is the instantaneous speed
----- as ∆t → 0 -----
∆t ∆t the point P and
at 5
∆t
vP = ∆ s- as ∆t → 0 4
----- ∆ s- ∆ s-
∆t ----- as ∆t → 0 is the gradient of 3
CORE

the displacement–time ----- as ∆t → 0

∆t 2 ∆t
∆ s- 1
----- as ∆t → 0
∆t at the point P.
graph 2 0
time / s
s = kt 0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0. 8 1.0 1.2 1.4

ds- = 2kt (Those students who are familiar with calculus will recognise Figure 215 Velocity-time graph for a falling ball
---- 2 2
dt thissprocess
= kt as differentiation. The equation for the above graph velocity s = kt
------------------
-
2 ds time change of velocity
is s = kt such that the derivative ----- = 2kt is the The acceleration is the time and in this
velocity dt case this is equal to the gradient of the straight line
------------------
-
timeinstantaneous speed).
gradient at any time t and hence the and is equal to 10 m s -2. This is a situation of constant
acceleration but even when the acceleration is not constant
When sketching or plotting a displacement-time graph we the acceleration velocity at any- instant is equal to the gradient of
------------------
have to bear in mind that displacement is a vector quantity. the velocity–time timegraph at that instant.
Consider for example, the situation of an object that leaves
point A, travels with uniform speed in a straight line to In section 2.1.2 we saw that we defined instantaneous
point B, returns to point A at the same constant speed acceleration as
and passes through point A to a point C. If we ignore the ∆v
a = ------ as ∆t → 0
accelerations at A and C and regard the point A as the ∆t
zero reference point, then a sketch of the displacement- dv
∆v a = ------
time graph will look like that shown in Figure ------ as ∆t → 0
a = 214. Students familiar with calculus will recognise that dt
∆t acceleration is the derivative 2
d ds ddvs
a = ----- -----a = -------
-
dt dt ∆-----
v -2
dt
B - as ∆t → 0
a = -----
dt
2 ∆t
d ds d s
a = ----- ----- = -------- which can also be written as d
dt dt 2 a = --
dt
displacement

d
2
d ds d s
a = ----- ----- = --------
dt dt 2
A t1 time dt
2t1

C We can also determine distances from speed–time graphs.

This is easily demonstrated with the graph of Figure 216
Figure 214 Displacement-time Graph which shows the speed time graph for constant speed.

Velocity (speed) - time graphs 40

The graph in Figure 215 shows how the velocity of the 30

speed / m s –1

falling ball varies with time.

20

10

0
0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 time / s

Figure 216 Speed-time graph to determine distance

40

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 Mechanics

The distance travelled is just speed × time. So at a constant (a) the acceleration of the train in the first 3
speed of 20 m s-1 after 10 s the object will have travelled minutes is the gradient of the line AB.
200 m. This is of course equal to the area under the line
45
between t = 0 and t = 10 s. Therefore, we have, a = 45+ 0.25 m s-2
=
180
180
If the velocity is not constant then the area under a (b) the acceleration of the train after the brakes
velocity–time graph will also be equal to the displacement. are applied is the gradient of the line

CORE
So, for the falling ball, we see from the velocity time graph, 45
45
Figure 215, that the distance travelled after 1.0 s is equal CD120
=- = - 0.38 m s-2
to the area of the triangle of base 1.0 s and height 10 m s-1 120
equals = ½ × 1.0 s × 10 m s-1 = 5.0 m (c) the distance travelled by the train is the
total area under the graph.

Total area
Example
= area of triangle ABE + area BCFE + area of triangle CDF

A train accelerates uniformly from rest to reach a speed of = 17550 = 18000 m

45 m s-1 in a time of 3.0 min. It then travels at this speed for a
further 4.0 min at which time the brakes are applied. It comes = 18 km.
to rest with constant acceleration in a further 2.0 min.
Acceleration-time graphs
Draw the velocity-time graph for the journey and from
the graph calculate If the acceleration of an object varies it is quite tricky
to calculate the velocity of the object after a given time.
(a) the magnitude of the acceleration between However, we can use an acceleration-time graph to solve
0 and 3.0 min the problem. Just as the area under a velocity-time graph is
(b) the magnitude of the acceleration after the the distance travelled then the area under an acceleration-
brakes are applied time graph is the speed achieved. For the falling ball the
(c) the total distance travelled by the train acceleration is constant with a value of 10 m s–2. A plot of
acceleration against time will yield a straight line parallel
to the time axis, Figure 218. If we wish for example to find
Solution the speed 3.0 s after the ball is dropped, then this is just the
area under the graph:

The graph is shown plotted below 12

10
acceleration / m s–2

speed – time graph

50 8
6
40
4
speed / m s –1

30 2

20 0
0 1 2 3 4 5
time / s
10

Figure 218 Acceleration - time graph

0
0 100 200 300 400 500 600 time / s
We could of course have found the speed directly from the
definition of uniform acceleration i.e.

speed = acceleration × timeExample

41

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 Chapter 2

-1
is 5 m s . Clearly the determination of speed (and therefore
Example velocity and acceleration) depends on what it is measured
relative to.

The acceleration of an object increases uniformly at a rate Generally speaking, if the speed of a particle A relative to
of 3.0 m s-2 every second. If the object starts from rest, an assigned point or reference frame O is VA and the speed
calculate its speed after 10 s. of a particle B relative to the same point is VB, then the
CORE

velocity of A relative to B is the vector difference VA – VB

(See Topic 1.3)
Solution
The example that follows illustrates how relative velocity
is very important in situations such as plotting a correct
A plot of the acceleration-time graph for this situation is course for an aircraft or for a boat or ship.
shown in the graph below.

Example
–2
acceleration / m s
30
The Figure below shows the two banks of a river. A
20
ferryboat operates between the two points P and Q that
10 are directly opposite each other.

time /s Q
2 4 6 8 10 12

The speed attained by the object after 10 s is the area under 90 m –1

the line. 1.2 m s

Therefore, speed = area enclosed by acceleration–time

graph
P
= ₂-¹ × 10 × 30 = 150 m s-2
The speed of flow of the river relative to the riverbanks
To summarise : is 1.2 m s-1 in the direction shown. The speed of the ferry
boat in still water is 1.8 m s-1 in a direction perpendicular
• the gradient of a displacement-time graph is equal to the river banks. The distance between P and Q is 90 m.
to the velocity (speed)
• the gradient of a velocity (speed)-time graph is Clearly, if the ferryboat sets off from P directly towards Q,
equal to the acceleration it will not land at Q.
• the area under a velocity (speed)-time graph is
equal to the distance. It is left as an exercise for you to show that the speed of the
• the area under an acceleration-time graph is the ferryboat relative to the speed of the water is 2.2 m s -1 and
change in velocity. that it will land at a point 60 m downstream of Q. You should
also show that, in order to land at Q, the ferry boat should
2.1.9 Relative motion leave P heading upstream at an angle of 56° to the riverbank
and that the time taken to cross to Q is about 67 s.
Suppose that you are standing on a railway station platform
and a train passes you travelling at 30 m s-1. A passenger For an aircraft, the rate of water flow becomes the wind
on the train is walking along the corridor in the direction speed and for a ship at sea it becomes a combination of
-1
of travel of the train at a speed of 1 m s . From your point wind, tide and current speeds.
-1
of view the speed of the person is 31 m s . In another
situation a car A is travelling at a speed of 25 m s-1 and The idea of relative measurement has far reaching
overtakes a car B that is travelling in the same direction consequences as will become clear to those of you who choose
-1
at a speed of 20 m s . The speed of car A relative to car B to study Special Relativity (Option D or in Option H.)

42

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 Mechanics

2.2 Forces and Dynamics

of mass is the kilogram and the standard is the mass of a
2.2.1 Calculate the weight of a body using the platinum alloy cylinder kept at the International Bureau of
expression W=mg. Weights and Measures at Sevres near Paris.

CORE
2.2.2 Identify the forces acting on an object and We shall see in section 2.2.8 that when we talk about the
draw free-body diagrams representing the weight of a body what we actually mean is the gravitational
forces acting. force that the Earth exerts on the body. So weight is a force
and since the force of gravity varies from place to place
2.2.3 Determine the resultant force in different and also with height above the Earth’s surface, the weight
situations of a body will also vary but it’s inertial and gravitational
© IBO 2007
mass remains constant.

2.2.1 Mass and weight

Exercise 2.10
Before developing the ideas of Newtonian Mechanics, it is
important to discuss the concepts of mass and weight. In
everyday usage, mass and weight are often interchangeable; in 1. This exercise is designed to help you distinguish
physics there is a fundamental difference between the concepts. between the concepts of mass and weight. Here are
six different hypothetical activities
So what is mass? Some textbooks will tell you that it is
the ‘quantity of matter’ in a body. However, this is pretty (a) You weigh yourself using bathroom scales.
meaningless for two reasons. It begs the question as to (b) You determine the mass of an object by
what is meant by ‘matter’ and also it gives no means of using a chemical beam balance.
quantifying mass. In respect of the latter, if a physicist (c) You determine the density of lead.
cannot measure something in the laboratory then that (d) You drop a brick on your foot.
something does not belong to physics. (e) You trap your fingers in a car door.
(f) You design a suspension bridge.
Mass is one of the so-called fundamental properties of all
matter and essentially measures a body’s inertia, that is, Suppose that you were able to carry out these
a body’s reluctance to change its state of motion. Moving activities on the moon. Discuss how would the
bodies tend to keep on moving in the same direction and result of each activity compare with the result
stationary bodies don’t start moving by themselves. The when carried out on Earth.
more massive a body, the more reluctant it is to change it’s
state of motion. As we shall see in Section 2.2.15, it is quite 2.2.2 Identifying forces and free-
possible to give a logical definition to mass that enables a body diagrams
physicist to quantify the concept. However, this definition
does not tell you what mass is and why particles that make
up bodies should have mass is one of the great unsolved Force
mysteries of physics. The situation is further complicated
by the fact that there are two types of mass. There is the The word force crops up in very often in everyday usage
mass we have just described, inertial mass and then there but what actually does a physicist mean by force? One
is the mass a body has that gives rise to the gravitational thing is for certain, a physicist will not be able to tell
attraction between bodies. This is the gravitational mass you what a “force” is and in many respects the question
of a body. We saw in Section 2.1.4 that experiment shows has little meaning in physics. To a physicist a force is
that the acceleration of free fall is independent of the mass recognised by the effect or effects that it produces. A
of an object. This suggests that gravitational mass and force is something that can cause an object to
inertial mass are in fact equivalent. (See section 2.2.8)
• deform i.e. change its shape
The equivalence of gravitational and inertial mass is one of • speed up
the cornerstones of Einstein’s theory of general relativity • slow down
and is discussed in more detail in Option H. The SI unit • change direction.

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 Chapter 2

The last three of these can be summarised by stating that In Figure 222 the blue arrows show the tension forces set
a force produces an acceleration. up in the spring. There is a force that opposes the pulling
force and a force equal in magnitude to this force is also
So if you were to see an object that is moving along in exerted by the spring on the fixed support.
a straight line with constant speed, suddenly change
direction you would know immediately that a force had
ion force g for
ce
acted on it even if you did not see anything tangible Fixed pole Tens Pu l l i n
CORE

‘pushing’ on the object. This is not as daft as it sounds,

just think of an object falling to the ground. The fact that
free falling objects accelerate means that a force is acting x
on them. As we have seen in Section 2.2.1, this force is the
force of gravity that the Earth exerts on the object and is
the weight of the body. We shall discuss the gravitational
force in more detail in Topic 6.1.
Figure 222 Tension forces in a spring
Since a force can produce an acceleration, it is clearly
a vector quantity. Hence, if two or more forces act on a One thing that you will note as you pull the spring, is
particle to find the resultant acceleration we have to find that the further you extend the spring, then the greater
the resultant force. We use the word particle here because the force that you have to exert in order to extend it even
if forces act on a body they can produce a deformation as further. You can investigate how the force required to
well as an acceleration. If they act on a particle that ideally extend the spring varies with the extension e of the spring
has no physical dimensions then it can only produce an by simply hanging weights of different values on the end
acceleration. of a vertically suspended spring. (The force of gravity
measured in newtons that acts on a mass M can be found
Spring forces to a very good approximation by multiplying M by 10).
The results for a typical spring in which the force F is
An interesting and very important type of force arises in plotted against the extension e is shown in Figure 223.
connection with springs. A typical spring can be made
by taking a length of wire and winding it round a pencil
F/N
such that each successive turn (coil) is in contact with the
previous turn. However, all school laboratories usually
posses a variety of commercially available springs. If you X
hold one end of a spring in one hand and pull the other
end then clearly to extend the spring you have to exert a
force on the spring. If you don’t hold one end of the spring,
then when you pull, it will accelerate in the direction that e /m
you are pulling it. Holding one end and pulling the other
produces a tension force in the spring. This is illustrated in Figure 223 Graph of force against extension of a spring
Figure 221.
Up to the point X the force F is directly proportional to e.
beyond this point the proportionality is lost. If the point X
is passed, the spring can become permanently deformed
Pull in such a way that when the weights are removed the
spring will not go back to its original length. In the region
Fixed pole
of proportionality we can write

x F = ke

where k is a constant whose value will depend on the

particular spring. For this reason k is called the spring
constant. This spring behaviour is a specific example of a
Figure 221 Forces on a spring more general rule known as Hooke’s law of elasticity after
the 17th century physicist Robert Hooke. For this reason
the region of proportionality is often referred to as the

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 Mechanics

‘Hookey region’ or ‘elastic region’ and point X is called the Weak-interaction

‘elastic limit’. We can see that a spring can be calibrated
to measure force and no doubt your physics laboratory A force which is about 1026 times stronger than gravity
has several so-called “newton metres”. However, you is the so-called weak-interaction. This is the interaction,
will discover that these newton metres do not provide a which is responsible for certain aspects of the radioactive
particularly reliable method of measuring force. decay of nuclei.

CORE
Electromagnetic interaction
Exercise 2.7
The electromagnetic interaction is some 1037 times stronger
than gravity and this is the force that exists between
1. The graph below shows how the length of a spring particles as a consequence of the electrical charge that
varies with applied force. they carry.

Strong nuclear interaction

15
F /N The strongest of all the forces is the strong nuclear
10 interaction (or just strong-interaction). This is some 1039
times stronger than gravity and it is the force that holds
5 the protons and neutrons together in the nucleus.

All four of these interactions are discussed in more detail

10 20 30 length /cm throughout this book. However, a simple way of looking
at them is to think of the gravitational force as being
i. State the value of the unstretched length of the force that accounts for planetary motion and the
the spring. way that galaxies are put together. The electromagnetic
ii. Use data from the graph to plot another interaction is the force that accounts for the way in which
graph of force against extension and from the electrons are arranged in atoms and as such is the force
this graph determine the spring constant. that accounts for all chemical and biological processes.
The strong interaction accounts for the nuclear structure
Fundamental forces of the atom and the weak interaction accounts for how
the nucleus comes apart. Physicists would like to unify all
A discussion on forces would not be complete without these forces into just one force. That is they would like to
some reference to the so-called fundamental forces or find that all the interactions were just special cases of one
interactions as physicists prefer to call them. fundamental interaction. There has been some success in
unifying the weak and the electromagnetic interaction but
Although at first sight there seems to be a bewildering up to now that is about as far as it has got.
number of different types of force, pushes, pulls, friction,
electrical, magnetic etc. physicists now recognise that Free-Body Diagrams
all the different forces arise from just four fundamental
forces. We have seen that we can represent the forces acting
on a particle by lines with arrows, the lengths of which
Gravitational force represented the relative magnitude of the forces. Such
diagrams are a useful way to represent the forces acting on
The weakest of the four is the gravitational force. As we a body or particle and are called free-body diagrams.
have seen, this is the force that gives rise to the weight of
an object. However, as mentioned, we also understand Figure 225 shows an object of mass M that is suspended
this force to act between all particles in the Universe. vertically by a thread of negligible mass. It is then pulled to
one side by a force of magnitude F and held in the position
shown.

45

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 Chapter 2

2.2.3 Determine the resultant

force in different
situations

Example
CORE

Mass = M Two forces act on particle P as shown in the Figure below

(N stands for ‘newton’ and is the SI unit of force as we shall
Figure 225 Forces acting on an object see in the next section.)

The free-body diagram for the forces acting on the object Determine the magnitude of the net force acting in the
in Figure 225 is shown in Figure 226 horizontal direction and the magnitude of the net force
acting in the vertical direction and hence determine the
T resultant force acting on P.

4.0 N
B 6.0 N
30°
P
F

A The component of the 4.0 N in the horizontal direction is

4.0 cos 30 = 3.5 N.

Hence the magnitude of the force in the horizontal

direction is 2.5 N.
Weight = Mg
R
Figure 226 The Free-body Force Diagram for Fig. 225 2.0 N
θ
The weight of the object is Mg and the magnitude of the 2.5 N
tension in the thread is T.
The component of the 4.0 N force in the vertical direction
The object is in equilibrium (see 2.2.6) and so the net force is 4.0 sin 30 = 2.0 N and this is the magnitude of the force
acting on it is zero. This means that the vertical components in the vertical direction.
of the forces must be zero as must the horizontal
components. Therefore, in the diagram the line A is equal The Figure above shows the vector addition of the
in length to the arrow representing the force F and the line horizontal and vertical components.
B is equal in length to the arrow representing the weight.
The tension T, the “resultant” of A and B, is found by the The resultant R has a magnitude = 3.2 N
using the dotted line constructions. When producing
a free-body diagram. there is no need to show these and the angle θ = tan -1 (2.0/2.5) = 39°.
constructions. However, as well as being in the appropriate
directions, the lengths of the arrows representing the forces
should be approximately proportional to the magnitudes
of the forces. The following example is left as an exercise
for you .

EXERCISE: Draw a free-body force diagram of the forces

acting on an aircraft which is flying horizontally with
constant velocity.

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 Mechanics

2.2.4 State Newton’s first law of motion. 2.2.5 D

�escribe
��������������������
examples of

2.2.5 Describe examples of Newton’s first law.

Newton’s first law
2.2.6 State the condition for translational If you eliminate friction and give an object a momentary
equilibrium. push, it will continue moving in the direction of the push

CORE
with constant velocity until it is acted upon by another
2.2.7 Solve problems involving translational force. This can be demonstrated to a certain degree using
equilibrium. the linear air-track. It is to a limited degree since it is
© IBO 2007
impossible to eliminate friction completely and the air
track is not infinite in length. It is in this sense impossible
2.2.4 State Newton’s first law of to prove the first law with absolute certainty since sooner
motion rather than later all objects will encounter a force of some
kind or another.

At the beginning of this chapter we stated that the general In fact Arthur Eddington (1882- 1944), is reputed to have
mechanics problem is, that given certain initial conditions quoted Newton’s first law thus:
of a system, to predict the future behaviour of the system.
The method that Newton devised to solve this problem is ‘Every object continues in a state of rest or uniform motion
encompassed in his celebrated three laws of motion which in a straight line in so far as it doesn’t.’
he published in his Principia Mathematica circa 1660.
Essentially Newton tells us to find out the forces acting on By this he meant that nothing in the Universe is ever at
the system. If we know these then we should in principle rest and there is no such thing as straight line motion.
able to predict the future behaviour of the system.
However, we are inclined to believe that if a body is not
Newton’s Fist Law is essentially qualitative and is based acted upon by a force, then Galileo’s description of its
on the work done by Galileo. Prior to Galileo’s work on motion is correct.
mechanics the Aristotelian understanding of motion was
the accepted view namely that a constant force is needed It is sometimes difficult to discard the Aristotelian view of
to produce constant motion. This actually seems to fit in motion particularly in respect of objects which are subject
with every day experience; if you stop pushing something to a momentary force. Consider the example shown in
then it will stop moving, to keep it moving you have to Figure 229:
keep pushing it. Galileo’s brilliance was to recognise
that the opposite is actually the case and his idea is 1. forward thrust 2.
ball ball
summarised in the statement of Newton’s First Law: every
object continues in a state of rest of uniform motion in a
straight line unless acted upon by an external force.
gravity gravity
The Aristotelian view does not take into account that when
you push something another force is acting on the body Figure 229 Aristotelian and Galilean forces on a ball
that you are pushing, namely the force of friction. In some
situations the frictional force, as we have seen, acting on a A girl throws a ball towards another girl standing some
moving object is actually a function of the object’s velocity metres away from her, it is tempting to think that, as
and in fact increases with velocity. Hence a greater engine Aristotle did, there must be a forward thrust to keep the
power is required to move a car at high speed than at low ball moving through the air as shown in 1. However, if air
speed. We shall return to this idea later. resistance is neglected, the only force acting on the ball is
gravity as shown in 2.

47

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 Chapter 2

Suppose that we were to pull the object with a force as

2.2.6, 2.2.7 applied to it as shown in Figure 233.
S�����������������������
tate the condition for
translational equilibrium

There are essentially two types of equilibrium, static

CORE

and dynamic. If an object is at rest, then it is in static

equilibrium and, if it is moving with constant velocity,
then it is in dynamic equilibrium. It follows from Newton’s
first law that the condition for both equilibriums is that
the net force acting on the object is zero. We can express Figure 233 Forces on the book
that mathematically as Σ F = 0. That is the vector sum of
the forces acting on the object is zero. In this situation, it is quite likely that the book will not
move along the table but actually rotate in the direction
Static equilibrium shown by the arrow in Figure 233.

Consider the simple case of a book resting on a table. Clearly This again demonstrates that in fact we should apply the
gravity acts on the book and without the intervention of Newton laws of motion to particles. Unless the pulling
the table, the book would fall to the ground. The table force acts through what we call the centre of mass of the
therefore exerts an equal and opposite force on the book. object then the pulling force and the frictional force can
This force we call the normal reaction. The force acting on produce rotation. This is quite a subtle point. However, in
the book are shown in Figure 231 many situations in this chapter we will refer to objects and
bodies when strictly speaking we mean particles. There
N normal reaction is in fact a branch of mechanics known as Rigid Body
W=N Mechanics which specifically deals with the mechanics of
actual bodies rather than particles. This is not covered in
the IB course. However, we can still get quite a long way
surface of table with mechanics by considering bodies to act as particles.

W weight of the book (due to gravity) 2.2.8 State Newton’s second law of motion.

Figure 231 Static forces on a book 2.2.9 Solve problems involving Newton’s second
law.
Dynamic equilibrium © IBO 2007

Now consider the case where the book, or any other object, 2.2.8 Newton’s second law of
is pulled along the surface of the table with constant motion
velocity. Gravity and the normal reaction are still acting
but there is now a frictional force acting which is equal
in magnitude but opposite in direction to the pulling The vector form of the equations relating to Newton’s
force. The force diagram for this situation is shown in Second Law given in this section, show that the vectors
Figure 232. act in the same straight line (for example, the force and
acceleration in F = ma). In the IB Physics data booklet, all
vector equations are given in scalar form i.e. they relate just
the magnitudes of the quantities.

Newton’s First Law as we have seen is qualitative in nature.

With his second law we move into quantitative territory for
it is essentially the second law that enables us to tackle the
general mechanics problem (at least in principle). A force
produces an acceleration when it acts on a particle and
Figure 232 Dynamic forces on a book Newton argued that for a given particle the acceleration is

48

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 Mechanics

directly proportional to the force acting and is in the same We can use Newton’s Second Law to understand the
direction as the applied force. Furthermore the constant of equivalence between inertial and gravitational mass. A
proportionality that relates the two is the inertial mass of simple argument shows this to be so. If we assume that the
the particle. We can therefore write that gravitational force F that the Earth exerts on an object is
G
proportional to the gravitational mass m of the object.
G
F=ma We can write this as

CORE
This is Newton’s second law in its simplest form. There are F = Km
G G
however, many situations where the mass of the system
does not remain constant e.g. a firework rocket, sand where K is a constant.
falling on to a conveyor belt etc. It is therefore helpful to
express the law in a more general form. The acceleration g of the object is given by Newton’s second
law.
We can express the acceleration a in terms of the rate of
change of velocity i.e. ∆v F = Km = m g
F = m × ------ G G I
∆t
∆v
F = m × ------ where m is the inertial mass of the object.
∆t I

We now define a quantity called the linear momentum p But experiment shows that g is a constant and has the
of the object as same value for all objects. Hence, it follows from the above
p = mv equation that m = m with g = K.
G I
pp == mv
mv
If we have an independent definition of inertial mass, then
such that we can now write Newton’s second law if the we can use the second law to define a unit of force. The SI
form unit of force is the newton (N) and it is that force which
∆p produces an acceleration of 1 m s-2 in a mass of 1 kg. This
F = ------- is an absolute definition in that it does not depend on the
∆t
∆p
F = ------- properties of any material or any outside influence such as
∆t
We shall discuss the concept of momentum in more detail pressure and temperature.
in Section 2.2.10
The second law also enables us to quantify the relationship
Although it is possible to verify Newton’s Second Law between mass and weight. As has been previously stated
directly by experiment it’s real validity is understood the acceleration of free fall is the same for all objects. If its
in terms of the experimentally verifiable results that value is g and an object has a mass m then from the second
it predicts. In a sense this law is the whole of Classical law we see that the gravitational force exerted on it by the
Mechanics and tells us that if we pay attention to the Earth has a value mg. Hence mg is the weight of the object.
forces then we can find the acceleration and if we know If we take g to have a value of 10 m s­-2 then a mass of 1 kg
the acceleration then we know the future behaviour of the will have a weight of 10 N close to the surface of the Earth.
particle. On the Moon where the acceleration of gravity is about
1.7 m s-2 a mass of 1 kg will have a weight of about 1.7 N.
Newton in essence says find the force law governing
a system and you will be able to predict its behaviour. In the rest of this section we will look at some examples of
Unfortunately, it is not always possible to know the the application of the second law and give some exercises.
force law. Newton himself gave one, his famous law of Hopefully, this will help you gain familiarity with its use.
gravitation, which we will look at in Topic 6.1. However, Remember that it is a very, very important law.
in such situations as the collision of two billiard balls we
do not know the force acting nor do we know the force
acting between the millions of molecules of a gas, solid
or liquid. In situations such as these we have to find some
other means of solving the problem and these we look at
some of these methods in Sections 2.2.12 and 2.3.6.

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 Chapter 2

2.2.9 S������������������������
olve problems involving Solution
Newton’s second law
2 2 2 2
v can
We = uuse+the
2asequation v = u + 2as to calculate the
magnitude of the average acceleration of the car.
Example
CORE

In this instance we have that u = 30, v = 0 and s = 180, so that

The diagram below shows a block of wood of mass 1.0 kg 2 2 2 900-

+ 2 × 180 a Ÿ a = – 900
0 = 30 + 2 × 180 a Ÿ2
attached via a pulley to a hanging weight of mass 0.5 kg. 0 a==30– --------
360 ---------
360
Assuming that there is no friction between the block
and the bench and taking g to be 10 m s–2, calculate the = – 2.5 m s-2
acceleration of the system.
The negative sign indicates that the car is slowing down.

1.0 kg pulley
Using Newton’s second law (F = ma) we have that

F = 70 × -2.5 = –175.

Hence the average force on the person, is 175 N.

0.50 kg

Exercise 2.9

1. A person stands on bathroom scales placed on the

Solution floor of a lift. When the lift is stationary the scales
record a weight of 600 N. The person now presses
the button for the 6th floor. During the journey to
The force acting on the system is the weight of the hanging the 6th floor the scales read 680 N, then 600 N,
mass which is 0.50 kg = 5 N then 500 N and finally 600 N. Explain these
observations and calculate any accelerations that
Using Newton’s second law F = m a the lift might have during the journey.

we have 5.0 = (1.5) a 2. Three forces act as shown on a particle of mass

0.500 kg as shown in this Figure. Calculate the
Hence a = 3.3 acceleration of the particle.

That is, the acceleration is 3.3 m s-2.

3.00 N
Example 4.00 N
5.00 N
143°

A person of mass 70 kg is strapped into the front seat

of a car, which is travelling at a speed of 30 m s–1. The
car brakes and comes to rest after travelling a distance of
180 m. Estimate the average force exerted on the person
during the braking process.

50

070813 Phys chapter 2.indd 50 29/11/2007 1:36:39 PM

 Mechanics

Also, in terms of the momentum change we have seen that

2.2.10 Define linear momentum and impulse. we can express the second law as

2.2.11 Determine the impulse due to a time varying ∆p

F =
force by interpreting a force-time graph ∆t

2.2.12 State the law of conservation of linear F ∆t =produced

Here Δp is the change in momentum ∆p by the

CORE
momentum. force F in time Δt.
∆p
2.2.13 Solve problems involving momentum and From the second law in the form F = we see that
impulse. ∆t
F ∆t = ∆p
(Students should be familiar with elastic and F ∆t = ∆p
inelastic collisions and explosions. Knowledge of The term F ∆t is called the impulse of the force and it is
the coefficient of restitution is not required). a very useful concept in solving certain types of problem
© IBO 2007
particularly in situations where the force acts for a short
time such as kicking a football. We also see by expressing
2.2.10 Linear momentum and the second law in this way that an equivalent unit for
impulse momentum is Ns.

2.2.11 Determine the impulse due

In his Principia Mathematica Newton introduces the idea to a time varying force
of quantity of motion in which he brings together the inertia
of a body and the speed with which it is moving. The two
quantities mass and speed do seemed to be linked in the Suppose that the force exerted on football when it is kicked
sense that taken together they have an effect on inertia. varies with time as shown in Figure 236.
An ocean liner of mass several thousand tonnes moving
at even a very low speed takes a lot of stopping. If it does
not stop before coming into dock it will do an enormous 50
amount of damage when it hits the dock. Similarly a bullet
with a mass of several grams moving with very high speed 40
also takes a lot of stopping and can do great damage in
the process of coming to rest. Rather than combining 30
Force / N

mass and speed, following Newton we combine mass and

velocity and, as we saw in the section on Newton’s Second 20
Law, we define the linear momentum p (the quantity that
10
Newton called quantity of motion) of a body as
0
p = mv 0 0.05 0.1 0.15 0.20 0.25 0.30 time / s

Note that momentum is a vector quantity and that the unit Figure 236 Force Time Graph
is kg m s-1.
Since the area under the graph is equal to the impulse we
In his Principia Newton states his Second Law of Motion can calculate the speed with which the football leaves the
as follows: The rate of change of linear momentum of a foot.
particle is directly proportional to the impressed force
acting upon it and takes place in the direction of the The area equals
--- × ( 50 × 0.14 ) + ( 0.14 × 50 ) + --- × ( 50 × 0.08 )1
impressed force. 1 1
---=×13.5
( 50N×s0.14 ) + ( 0.14 ×
2 2 2
This is in fact the form in which you should remember the
second law of motion since the law in the form F = ma is Suppose that the mass of the football is 0.40 kg then from
actually, as we have seen, a special case. 13.5
---------- 13.5-
0.40 F ∆t = ∆p = m∆v , we have that ∆v = --------- 0.40
= 34.

51

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 Chapter 2

That is, the change in velocity is 34 ms-1.

2.2.12 S
�tate
����������������
the law of
In actuality one is much more likely to use the conservation of linear
measurement of the speed of the football to estimate the
average force that is exerted by the foot on the football. momentum
The time that the foot is in contact with the ball can be
measured electronically and the speed of the football can One of the most important aspects of Newton’s laws is
CORE

be computed by measuring its time of flight. that the second and third law (See section 2.2.14) lead
to the idea that in any interaction in a closed (isolated)
Here is another example in which we use the ideas of system, linear momentum is always conserved, that is it
impulse and the rate of change of momentum. stays constant. By a closed system, we mean one in which
no external forces act. We can get an idea of this from the
fact that the second law tells us that the external impressed
Example force is equal to the rate of change of momentum. If there
is no external force then there is no rate of change of
momentum of the system as a whole and therefore the
Water is poured from a height of 0.50 m on to a top pan momentum does not change, that is, it remains constant.
balance at the rate of 30 litres per minute. Estimate the
reading on the scale of the balance. If we consider for example, a system that comprises
interacting particles, when two particles A and B collide
when they are in contact, it follows from Newton’s third law
Solution that the force that A exerts on B is equal and opposite to
the force that B exerts on A. This means that the net force
that is exerted on the system comprising A and B is zero. If
We shall assume here that the water bounces off the top of the net force is zero then it follows that there is no change
the balance horizontally. Again we can calculate the speed in momentum of the system. In collision processes we can
with which the water hits the balance. therefore express the law of conservation of momentum as
momentum before collision = momentum after collision.
From the equation v2 = 2as However, the more general statement of the law is:

we have v2 = 2 × 10 × 0.50 = 10. So, v = 3.2 m s-1. If the total external force acting on a system is zero
then the momentum of the system remains constant (is
The mass of water arriving at the balance per second is conserved).

0.50 kg s-1. Or simply that: The momentum of a closed system is

constant (conserved).
The rate of change of momentum is therefore 0.50 × 32.
For those of you who do calculus the conservation of linear
= 1.6 N. momentum is easily derived from Newton’s second law. If we
write the second law in terms of a differential, we have then,
If the balance is calibrated in grams the reading will therefore if F = 0, p is constant.
be about 160 g.

Can you think of an example of where the theory of impulse 2.2.13 S

�olve
������������������������
problems involving
has been used to good effect? momentum and impulse
One example is the reason why crash barriers between the
opposite lanes on a highway are made of crumpling material. (Elastic and inelastic collisions are discussed in section 2.3.8)
The crumpling means that on collision, a car will come to
rest in a greater time. The change in momentum of the car We now look at a problem that cannot be solved by using
would be the same as if the barrier were made of concrete the Second Law in the form F = ma.
but the F in F∆t is now smaller since ∆t is larger.

52

070813 Phys chapter 2.indd 52 29/11/2007 1:36:40 PM

 Mechanics

-1
v = 6.3 m s

His change in momentum on coming to rest is therefore

70 × 6.3 N s.

This is equal to the impulse F∆t. hence we see that

CORE
2.0 m /s F = 70 × 6.3/2.0 = 220 N.

Figure 237 The conveyor belt problem

Suppose that sand is poured vertically at a constant rate of Admittedly this problem could have been solved by
400 kg s-1 on to a horizontal conveyor belt that is moving computing the acceleration of the man on landing and
with constant speed of 2.0 m s-1. (See Figure 237) coming to rest from the equation v = at. However, this
involves another step and is not as elegant a solution since
We wish to find the minimum power required to keep it doesn’t really get to the physics.
the conveyor belt moving with constant speed. In every
second the horizontal momentum of the sand changes by If he were to land on concrete then he would come to rest
400 × 2.0 kg m s-1. This means that the rate of change of much more quickly. However his change in momentum
momentum of the sand is 800 kg m s-2. would be the same hence the F in the impulse F∆t would
be much greater.
The force exerted on the conveyor belt by the sand is
therefore 800 kg m s-2. This force is the frictional force Along with the law of conservation of energy (see 2.3.6)
between the sand and the conveyor belt and it is this force (strictly speaking mass-energy, see topic 7.3.4), the law
which accelerates the sand to the speed of the conveyor of conservation of momentum is of great importance
belt. The power therefore to keep the conveyor belt moving in Physics. Although Newton’s laws are found not to
at this speed is this force multiplied by the speed of the work when applied to atoms and molecules and are also
belt. i.e. the power (P) equals (Fv) = 1600 W. (see below) modified by Relativity theory, the law of conservation of
momentum still stands. If you were to invent a new theory,
We can also work out the rate of change of kinetic energy no matter how elegant the theory, if it violates conservation
of the sand since the change in KE every second is of energy and momentum then you can forget it.
800 s-1 (see below). This is quite interesting since we see
that whatever the nature of the sand or the belt we always The beauty of a law such as the conservation of momentum
lose half the power in dissipation by the frictional force. is that we are able to predict an outcome without knowing
the intricacies of what actually is going on. When two
billiard balls collide, the forces that act during collision are
Example very complicated and we have no idea of their spatial and
time dependence. However, because we know that they
are equal and opposite we are able to predict the outcome
Estimate the force exerted on a man who jumps off a wall of the collision.
of height 2.0 m and lands in soft earth.
Figures 238-241 on the next page show some examples of
Explain why he would be likely to hurt himself if he landed collisions and their possible outcomes.
on concrete.
(Remember, momentum is a vector quantity).

Solution The outcome of a collision will depend on the mass of

each particle, their initial velocities and also how much
energy is lost in the collision. However, whatever the
We estimate the mass of the man as 70 kg and the time that outcome, momentum will always be conserved. Any
he comes to rest on landing on the earth to be 2.0 s. predicted outcome which violates the conservation of
linear momentum will not be accepted.
We can find the speed with which he hits the ground from
2
v = 2g h. i.e.

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 Chapter 2

Calculate
Exercise
(i) the impulse given to the ball
(ii) the average force exerted on the ball.
1. A bullet of mass 9.0 g leaves the barrel of a rifle
with a speed of 8.0 ×102 m s-1. The mass of the rifle
is 1.8 kg. If the rifle is free to move, calculate the 2.2.14 State newton’s third law
CORE

speed with which it recoils. of motion

2. Sarah is standing on the horizontal surface of a
frozen pond. She throws a ball of mass 250 g. The Students should understand that when two bodies A
ball leaves her hand with a horizontal speed of and B interact, the force that A exerts on B is equal and
8.0 m s-1. As a result, Sarah moves with an initial opposite to the force that B exerts on A.
speed of 5.0 cm s-1. Estimate Sarah’s mass.

2.2.15 Discuss examples of Newton’s third law.

© IBO 2007
3. In a particular thunderstorm, the hailstones
and raindrops have the same mass and terminal See Figure 241 below
velocity. Explain, with reference to Newton’s
Second Law why the hailstones hurt more that
raindrops when they hit you.

4. A football of mass 0.46 kg attains a speed of

7.7 m s-1 when kicked. The toe of the football boot
u1 in contact withuthe v v
with which it m
is kickeduis
1 m u22 ball m v 11 m v 22
for 0.26 s. m1 1 m22 m11 m22
u u2 v v2
Case 1:
mm11 u1 +1m2 u2 m2 = m1 m11v 1 + m2 vm22
m u u+ m u u2 = mv11v 1 + m2 v 2 v2
m11 1 1 2 2 m2 m1 m2
m1 u1 + m2 u2 = m1 v 1 + m2 v 2
u u v v
m1 m1uu111 + mu222u2 m2 = v 11 mm1 v 1 + m2 vm22 v 22
m1 m2 Figure 238 Case 1 m11 m2
u u v1 v2
Case 2: m1 m1 u11 – m22u2 m2 = m–1 m1 v 1 + mmv
m uu – mu22u2 = v1 –m1 v 1 + m22 v222 v2
m1 1 11 m2 m1 m2
m1 u1 – m2 u2 = –m1 v 1 + m2 v 2
m1 u1 – m2 u2 = Case 2
Figure 239 v =–m0 v + m2 v 2
u u v 11 = 01 1 v
m1 u11 u22 m2 m m v 22
Case 3: m1 m2 m11 m22
v1 = 0
u u v2
m1 m1 u11 – m22u2 m2 = v 1m=1 0 m2 v 2m2
m uu – mu22u2 = m2 v 2 v2
m1 1 11 m2 m1 m2
m1 u1 – m2 u2 Figure 240
= Case 3 m2 v 2
coupled
uu1 – m u u coupled v
Case 4: m m1u 2 m u22 = m1m2 v 2m2 v
m11 11 2
m22 m1 m2
coupled
u u2 v
m1 m1 u11 + m2 um2 2 = m 1(( m
coupled m2m2 )v
m1 +
m1uu11 + m2 u2 u2 = + m )v v
m1 m2 Figure 241 Case 4 m1 1 m2 2
m1 u1 + m2 u2 = ( m1 + m2 )v
54 m1 u1 + m2 u2 = ( m1 + m2 )v

070813 Phys chapter 2.indd 54 29/11/2007 1:36:43 PM

 Mechanics

As was suggested in the introduction, Newton’s Second

Law does not always work. It does not give the right A
answers when we apply it to atoms and molecules nor
does it give the right answer when particle are moving book
with speed close to that of the speed of light. However his
third law of motion as far as we know is valid across the X B table
whole of physics. It is really quite a remarkable piece of
Y

CORE
insight and has, as we shall see far reaching consequences.
E arth
In fact, Ernst Mach a famous turn of the century physicist
regarded the third law has Newton’s greatest contribution
to Mechanics. Figure 242 The four forces acting
on a book resting on a table
Newton formulated this law based on an idea first put
forward by Descartes. The law basically says that forces The table is actually incidental to the action of these forces.
always appear in equal and opposite pairs. To state the law The two forces are the equal and opposite pair referred to
more formally: in the third law such that

When a force acts on a body, an equal and opposite force X + Y =0

acts on another body somewhere in the universe.
If the table is not there, the book falls towards the Earth
We saw in our discussion on momentum conservation, and the Earth falls towards the book. Both the book and
that for momentum to be conserved when two bodies A the Earth will accelerate in accordance with Newton’s
and B collide, then whilst in contact, the force that A exerts second law. However, considering that the earth is some
on B is equal and opposite to the force that B exerts on A. 1026 times more massive than the book, we do not observe
Which is of course an example of Newton’s third law. the acceleration of the Earth.

The force A is the force that the table exerts on the book.
2.2.15 Discuss examples of The force B is the force that the book exerts on the table.
Newton’s third law These two forces are again an equal and opposite pair of
forces referred to in the third law such that

In some texts the law is stated as “to every action there is A + B =0

an equal and opposite reaction”. However, this can lead to
some confusion. To see why, let us look at the situation of So what is the origin of these two forces? They actually
the book on the table. The book is in equilibrium so we arise from the interaction forces between the molecules of
conclude that the force that the book exerts on the table the book and the molecules of the table. The interaction
is balanced by a “reaction force”, the force that the table force is complex but essentially between any two molecules
exerts on the book. We can ask the question “ what if the there is either a force of repulsion or a force of attraction.
book is so heavy that it breaks the table?”. Does this mean Which force operates depends on the separation of the
that Newton’s third law no longer works? No, because this molecules and, in equilibrium, the two molecules will take
is not an example of Newton’s third law. Let us look at the up a separation at which the repulsion force balances the
situation more carefully to see just how the third law is attraction force. If we “push” the molecules closer together
working. In Figure 242 we illustrate all the forces acting. the repulsion force becomes greater than the attraction
force and if the “push” is released the molecules will move
The weight of the book is the force X and this is the force back to the equilibrium position. It is this repulsion force
that the earth exerts on the book. The force Y is the force which stops you falling through the floor.
that the book exerts on the Earth.
If we “pull” the molecules further apart then the attraction
force becomes greater than the repulsion force and if we
release the “pull”, the molecules will move back to the
equilibrium position. The attraction force is why you need
to apply a force to stretch a spring and the repulsion force
is why you need to apply a force to compress a spring.

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 Chapter 2

The three situations are illustrated in Figure 243 force and mass, can be defined from one equation, F = m a.
Well, the answer is that they are not.
equilibrium:
If a system consists of two isolated particles that exert
The net force on each molecule is zero.
equal and opposite forces on each other, then the ratio
of their acceleration will be in the ratio of their masses.
One of the particles can be considered to be a “standard
CORE

There is now a net force of repulsion on each molecule. mass” and the acceleration of other particles interacting
with this standard can be measured in order to determine
their mass

There is now a net force of attraction on each molecule.

Exercises

In 1920, the Smithsonian published an original

paper by Robert Goddard titled, ‘A Method for
Figure 243 Forces between molecules Reaching Extreme Altitudes,’ in which Goddard
included a small section stressing that rockets
The magnitude of both the attraction and repulsion forces could be used to send payloads to the Moon.
depends on the separation of the molecules. The repulsion The next day, the New York Times wrote a scathing
force increases very rapidly as the molecules get closer editorial denouncing his theories as folly. Goddard was
together and this is why it requires a much greater force to ridiculed and made to look like a fool. The editorial stated
compress certain solids than it does to extend them. So we that travel in space by rocket was impossible because a
see that the table can still break without violating the third rocket would have no air to push against. Discuss, with
law. When the table breaks we just have a re-arrangement reference to Newton’s law why the editor of the New York
of its molecular structure. Times was actually the fool.

When students first encounter the third law they sometime

say things like ‘ if, when a force is exerted on an object 2.3 Work, Energy
there is an equal and opposite reaction, how can anything
ever move? Equal and opposite forces must mean the net and Power
force on everything is always zero.’ Think of the Earth and
the book. When the table is not present, there is a net force
on the book and it accelerates in accordance with Newton’s 2.3.1 Outline what is meant by work.
second law. It is the net force on the system of the Earth
and the book that is zero. Similarly if we think of a horse 2.3.2 Determine the work done by a non-
pulling a cart, the acceleration of the cart depends not on constant force by interpreting a force–
the forces that it might exert on something else, but on the displacement graph. A typical example
forces that are exerted on it. would be calculating the work done in
extending a spring. See 2.3.7
We have gone into the third law in some detail because
it is an area of physics which is often misunderstood by 2.3.3 Solve problems involving the work done
students. Basically, just remember to be careful when by a force.
© IBO 2007
identifying the system in which the equal and opposite
forces appear. Also remember that when computing the
acceleration of a body, it is the forces that act on the body 2.3.1 Outline what is meant by work
that are considered, not the forces that it exerts on other
bodies. The terms work and energy are used frequently in everyday
speech. However, although it is possible to give an exact
It is the third law, which enables physicists to give a logical physical definition of ‘work’ it is not so easy to define
definition of mass. This is something that you will not be precisely what is meant by ‘energy. We often use the term
expected to know for the examination and it is included for in the context of ‘having enough energy to get something
the inquisitive who are puzzled as to how two quantities, done’. So for the time being, let us be happy with this

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070813 Phys chapter 2.indd 56 29/11/2007 1:36:44 PM

 Mechanics

idea and also note that getting ‘something done’ usually

involves a transfer of energy from one form to another. Engine
For example a car engine uses fuel in order to get the car
moving and to keep it moving, you eat food in order to
live, oil is burned in a power station to provide electrical
energy and you can think of other examples. h
s
mg

CORE
θ
E ngine

2m g Figure 245 Using a slope

We shall assume that the surface of the slope is frictionless.

The work W done by the engine using the above definition
is:
mg
2h
W = force × s
h
where s is the distance up the slope.
mg 2m g
The force this time is the component of the weight down
Figure 244 Fuel used to lift a weight the slope. Hence,
��������

In Figure 244 we imagine a situation in which we are using W = mg sin θ × s

fuel in an engine whose function is to lift a weight mg to a
h h - , meaning that W = mgsin θ × s = mg sin
certain height. But sinθ = --- ⇒ s = ----------
s sin θ
h h h-
In the first diagram the engine lifts the sinθ = ---to⇒
weight s = ----------
a height - , meaning that W = mgsin θ × s = mg sin θ × ----------
meaning that
sin θ
h and in the second diagram the engine lifts a weight 2mgsin θ
s
to a height 2h. In the first situation let us suppose that the = mgh
3
engine requires 1 dm of fuel to complete the task. Then in
the second situation we would guess that the engine would That is,
require 4 dm3 of fuel. The amount of fuel used is a measure
of the energy that is transferred and to complete the tasks W = mgh
we say that the engine has done work. If we quantify the
term work then the amount of work that is done will be This is just the amount of work that the engine would
a measure of the energy that has been transferred in the have performed if it had lifted the weight directly. Our
performance of the tasks. Clearly the engine has done definition of work therefore becomes
work against a force, in this situation, the force of gravity.
If we double the force i.e. the weight, then the work done is Work = magnitude of the force × displacement in
doubled and if we double the distance through which the the direction of the force
weight is moved then the work done is also doubled. If we
double both together, then the work done is quadrupled. It Which is the same as
seems that we can define work as:
work = magnitude of the component of the force
Work = force × distance moved in the direction moved × the distance moved

However, we have to be careful in using this definition. The SI unit of work is the newton–metre and is called
Consider the situation below in which the engine lifts the the joule named after the 19th Century physicist James
weight up a slope to height h. Prescott Joule.

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 Chapter 2

2.3.2 The work done by a non- 2.3.3 Solve problems involving

constant force the work done by a force

Clearly, when a spring is stretched or compressed, work is

done. That a stretched spring or a compressed spring has Example
CORE

the potential to do work is apparent from many everyday

examples and it is left as an exercise for you to describe
some of the examples. A force of 100 N pulls a box of weight 200 N along a
smooth horizontal surface as shown in the Figure below.
Figure 246 (a) below shows a plot of a constant force 100 N
against displacement and Figure 246 (b) shows a plot of
the spring force against displacement. 45°

Graph 1 Graph 2
F orc e F orce Calculate the work done by the force

F (a) in moving the box a distance of 25 m along

F
the horizontal
(b) against gravity.

x x
d s
Solution
Figure 246 (a) and (b) Force vs displacement graphs

The area under each of the graphs is clearly equal to the (a) The component of the force along the
work done. In Figure 256 (a) when the force F undergoes a direction of motion, i.e., the horizontal�
displacement d the work done is Fd. In Figure 246 (b) when component, Fh, can be determined by using
the force F produces an extension s then the work done is the fact that
100 N
1 1 ​F​h​
___
--- Fswork done is
--- Fs . But in this case F = ks, hence the cos 45˚ = ​   ​
2 2 100 45°
1
1 1 2 --
- Fs
ks
2 --- × ( ks ) × s = --- ks 2 ⇔F
​ ​h​= 100 cos45˚
2 2
1 1 2
--- × ( ks ) × s = --- ks
2 The work that2 has been done is stored in the spring as = 71 N
elastic potential energy Eelas . The adjective potential in this That is, the component of the force along
1context
2 essentially means “hidden”.1Clearly 2 the direction of motion is 71N. Therefore
E elas = --- ks E elas = --- ks
2 2 the work done (F × ������������������������
s���������������������
) = 71 × 25 = 1780
1 2
E elas = --- ks That is, the work done is 1780 J.
2 (b) edThere is no displacement by the force in the
We can extend this idea to find the work done by any plsdirection
check p 95of for detailHence the work done
gravity.
non-constant force. If we know how the force depends by the force against gravity is zero.
on displacement then to find the work done by the force
we just compute the area under the force-displacement
graph. Suppose that a constant frictional force of 50 N acts on
the box. How much work is done against friction? Again,
using the fact that W = force × distance, �����������������
we have that the
work done is simply 50 �������������
��������������
25 = 1250 N.

Notice that in the above example we use the expressions

“work done by” and “work done against”. This occurs
over and over again in physics. For example the engine
lifting the weight does work against gravity. However, if

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 Mechanics

the weight is allowed to fall, the work is done by gravity. So how do we find out just how much work a moving
Strictly speaking we therefore have a sign convention for object is capable of doing?
work. The convention is that
In the diagram below, a force F moves an object of mass m
Work done on a system is negative. a distance d along a horizontal surface. There is no friction
between the object and the surface.
Work done by a system is positive.

CORE
F
In the example above, the box can be identified as the system.
m kg

Although this convention is not always important, in many d

mechanics situations, it is of great importance when we
come to consider the relationship between heat and work Figure 249 An example of kinetic energy
(Chapter 10) and in the relation between field strength
and potential (Chapter 9) We will assume that the object starts from rest. The force
F will accelerate the object in accordance with Newton’s
Second law and the magnitude of the acceleration will be
Exercise given by using the formula
F
F = ma, from which we obtain a = a---
a = --- F- F-
m- = ---
A man drags a sack of flour of mass 50 kg at constant m m F
a = ----
speed up an inclined plane to a height of 5.0 m. The plane We can use the equation v2 = u2 + 2as to findFan expression m
a = ----
makes an angle of 30° with the horizontal and a constant of the speed of the object after it has moved m a distance
frictional force of 200 N acts on the sack down the plane. d (= s).
2 2 F F 2 2Fd
v2 = (20 )2 + F+- 2d ⇒
2 ---
( 022) --- ---- vvd2⇒=
2 - 2Fd
= v2Fd
---------
(a) Calculate the work that the man does against v is,= v( 0=) +
That m - d⇒ m=- ---------
--------- -
m m m mF
- d ⇒ v = 2Fd
2 2 2
1 21v =2 ( 0 ) + 2 --- m
----------
i. friction. From which2 Fd =Fd --- mv2---F
21 2 2Fd m
v Fd --
= ( 0=) 2+mv- = mv
2 2---- d ⇒ v = ----------
ii. gravity. 2 m m1 2
The work done (Fd) by the force F inFd = --- mv
moving
1 2 2 the object a
distance d in the directionFd = ofmv --
- F is now therefore expressed
1 2 2
2.3.4 Outline what is meant by kinetic energy.
1--- mv21--- mv2 in terms of the properties of the body and its motion. The
--
2- mv 2
2 1 2
2.3.5 Outline what is meant by change in quantity --- mv is called the kinetic energy (KE) of the body
1 2 2
gravitational potential energy. --- mv
2 and is the energy that a body possesses by virtue of its
2.3.6 State the principle of conservation of motion. The kinetic energy of a body essentially tells us
energy. how much work the body is capable of doing.
1 21 2
E = 1--- mv = 2--- mv
E kk =E--
2k- mv
2.3.7 List different forms of energy and describe We denote the kinetic 2energy 2 by EK, so that 1 2
examples of the transformation of energy E k = --- mv
1--- 2 2
from one form to another. E k = mv
2
2.3.8 Distinguish between elastic and inelastic A very useful relationship exists between kinetic energy
collisions. and momentum.
© IBO 2007

We have that p = mv such that p2 = m2v2

2.3.4 Kinetic energy
Hence substituting for v2, we have
A moving object possesses the capacity to do work. A
hammer, for example, by virtue of its motion can be used p2 p2
to do work in driving a nail into a piece of wood. Such that... E K = and = mv2 = 2 EK
2m m

59

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 Chapter 2

To demonstrate the so-called principle of energy

2.3.5 Potential energy conservation we will solve a dynamics problem in
two different ways, one using the principle of energy
When an object is resting on top of a wall it has the potential conservation and the other using Newton’s laws and the
to do work. If it falls off the wall onto a nail sticking out kinematics equations. Example
of a piece of wood then it could drive the nail further into
the wood. Work is needed to lift the object on to the top of
Example
CORE

the wall and we can think of this work as being ‘stored as

potential energy in the object.
1
E elas = --- ks 2
2
In general if an object of mass m is lifted to a height h above An object of mass 4.0 kg slides from rest without friction
the surface of the earth then the work done is mgh and the down an inclined plane. The plane makes an angle of 30°
object has a potential energy also equal to mgh (force = mg, with the horizontal and the object starts from a vertical
displacement = h). However, we have to be careful when height of 0.50 m. Determine the speed of the object when
using this equation since if h is too large then we can no it reaches the bottom of the plane.
longer regard g as being constant. Also, we must note that
there is no zero of potential energy in this situation. (In
chapter 9 we will see how we define the zero of potential Solution
energy). If the object rests upon the ground and we dig a
hole, then the object has potential to do work when it falls
down the hole. The object in fact has gravitational potential The set-up is shown in this diagram:
energy by virtue of its position in the Earth’s gravitational
field. No matter where an object is placed in the Universe
it will be attracted by the gravitational force of the Earth. Reaction force
v=0
We say that the Earth has an associated gravitational field.
A h = 0.50
(Indeed all objects will have an associated gravitational
field as we will discuss in the chapters 6 and 9). At this 0.50 m
stage you should appreciate that when an object is moved mg
v= V
a distance ∆h in the Earth’s gravitational field and in the B 30°
direction of the field, its change in potential energy ∆EP h= 0
is:
We set ‘zero–level’ at point B, the base of the incline, so
∆EP = mg∆h that h = 0 and so that at point A, h = 0.50. At A, the object
has no kinetic energy (v = 0) and at point B, the object has
(provided that g is constant over the distance moved.) gained kinetic energy (v = V).

Another example of potential energy is, as we saw in Method 1: Kinematic solution

the Section 2.3.2, elastic potential energy. To summarise
therefore we have: The force down the plane is given by mgsinθ = 20 N.

∆EP = mg∆h mgsinθ = 20 N. Using Newton’s 2nd law (F = ma) gives the acceleration
and
20
1
E elas = --- ks 2 a = ------- = 5.0 m s –2.
2 4.0
(Note that we could have determined the acceleration by
writing down the component of g down the plane)
2.3.6 The principle of energy
conservation Using ​V2​ ​= u
​ 2​ ​+ 2as with u = 0, and s (the distance down

the plane)
(In Topic 7.3 we shall see that this should actually be the
principle of mass-energy conservation) = ​  0.50 0.50  ​ = 1.0
____ ​= ​  ______
sinθ sin30˚
___
We have, ​V2​ ​= ​02​ ​+ 2 × 5 × 1 ⇒ V = √
​ 10 ​ = 3.2 m s-1

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 Mechanics

Method 2: Energy Principle It was the great triumph of some late eighteenth and early
nineteenth physicists and engineers to recognise that this
As the object slides down the plane its potential energy ‘lost energy’ is transformed into thermal energy. If you rub
becomes transformed into kinetic energy. If we assume your finger along the top of a table you will definitely feel
that no energy is ‘lost’ we can write it getting warm. This is where the “lost” energy has gone.
It has in fact been used to make the molecules of the table
change in PE = mgh = gain in KE = _​ 21 mv​
​​ 2​ and the molecules of your finger vibrate more vigorously.

CORE
So that _​ 12 ​​mv​2​= mgh ⇒ V
​ 2​ ​= 2gh Another thing to notice is that this energy is “lost” in the
____ sense that we can’t get it back to do useful work. If there
⇒V=√
​ 2gh ​ were no friction between the object and the surface of the
plane then, when it reached the bottom of the plane, work
Using the values of g and h, we have that V = 3.2 m s-1. could be done to take it up to the top of the plane and this
cycle could go on indefinitely. (We could actually set up
That is, the object reaches a speed of 3.2 m s-1. the arrangement such that the objects KE at the bottom of
the plane could be used to get it back to the same height
Note that the mass of the object does not come into the again). It is what we call a reversible process. The presence
question, nor does the distance travelled down the plane. of friction stops this. If the object is dragged back up the
When using the energy principle we are only concerned with plane you won’t get the energy back that has been “lost”
the initial and final conditions and not with what happens due to friction, you will just “lose” more energy. This is an
in between. If you go on to study physics in more depth you irreversible process. We can now start to glimpse why, even
will find that this fact is of enormous importance. though it is impossible to destroy energy, it is possible to
“run out” of “useful energy”. Energy becomes as we say,
The second solution involves making the assumption degraded.
that potential energy is transformed into kinetic energy
and that no energy is lost. This is the so–called ‘energy The general principle of energy conservation finds its
principle’, this means the energy is conserved. formulation in the First law of Thermodynamics and
the consequences of this law and the idea of energy
Clearly in this example it is much quicker to use the energy degradation and its implication on World energy sources
principle. This is often the case with many problems and in is discussed in much more detail in Chapter 8.
fact with some problems the solution can only be achieved
using energy considerations.
2.3.7 Types of energy and energy
What happens if friction acts in the above example? transformations
Suppose a constant force of 16 N acts on the object as
it slides down the plane. Now, even using the energy
principle, we need the distance down the plane so we can (This links with Topic 8)
calculate the work done against friction
There are many different forms of energy and their
This is 16 × 1.0 = 16 J. The work done by gravity i.e. the transformations of which some examples are given here.
change in PE = 20 J
Thermal energy
The total work done on the object is therefore
This is essentially the kinetic energy of atoms and
20 – 16 = 4.0 J. molecules. It is sometimes incorrectly referred to as
‘heat’. The term heat actually refers to a transfer of energy
Hence the speed is now given by _​ 21 mv​
​​ 2​= 4.0. between systems.

To give v = 1.4 m s-1.

So in this problem, not all the work done has gone into
accelerating the object. We say that the frictional force has
dissipated energy. If we are to retain to the idea of energy
conservation then we must “account” for this “lost” energy.

61

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 Chapter 2

Chemical energy being elastic. The collision of two snooker (pool) balls is
very nearly elastic, as is the collision between two steel ball
This is energy that is associated with the electronic bearings. An interesting situation arises when the balls are
structure of atoms and is therefore associated with the of the same mass and one is at rest before the collision and
electromagnetic force. the collision takes place along a line joining their centres
as shown Figure 251.
An example of this is combustion in which carbon
u1 = u u2 = 0 v1 = v v2 = V
CORE

combines with oxygen to release thermal energy, light

energy and sound energy. m m
m m

Nuclear energy
Before After
This is the energy that is associated with the nuclear
structure of atoms and is therefore associated with the Figure 251 Rolling Balls
strong nuclear force.
Suppose that the speed of the moving ball is u and that
An example of this is the splitting of nuclei of uranium by the respective speeds of the balls after collision are v and
neutrons to produce energy. V. If we now apply the laws of momentum and energy
conservation we have conservation of momentum:
Electrical energy
mu = mv + mV
This is energy that is usually associated with an electric
current and is sometimes referred to incorrectly as conservation of energy
electricity. For example the thermal energy from a chemical
reaction (chemical energy) can be used to boil water and _​ 1 ​​mu​2​= _​ 1 ​​mv​2​+ _​ 1 ​​mV​2​
2 2 2
produce steam. The kinetic energy of the molecules of steam
(thermal energy) can be used to rotate magnets and this From which we see that u = v + V and u2 = v2 + V2
rotation generates an electric current. The electric current
transfers the energy to consumers where it is transformed The only solution to these equations is that u = V and v = 0.
into for example thermal and light energy (filament lamps)
and kinetic energy (electric motors).We shall learn later This means that the moving ball comes to rest after
that these different forms of energy all fall into the category collision and the ball that was at rest moves off with
of either potential or kinetic energy and are all associated the speed that the moving ball had before collision.
with one or other of the fundamental forces. This situation is demonstrated in that well known “toy”,
Newton’s Cradle.
Energy can be transformed from one form into another
and as far as we know energy can never be created nor
can it be destroyed. This is perhaps one of the most 2.3.9 Define power.
fundamental laws of nature and any new theories which
might be proposed must always satisfy the principle of 2.3.10 Define and apply the concept of efficiency.
energy conservation. A simple example of the principle
is, as we have seen, to be found in the transformation of 2.3.11 Solve problems involving momentum, work,
gravitational potential energy into kinetic energy. energy and power.
© IBO 2007

2.3.8 Elastic and inelastic 2.3.9 Power

collisions
Suppose that we have two machines A and B that are used
Collisions in which mechanical energy is not lost are called in lifting objects. Machine A lifts an object of weight 100
elastic collisions whereas collision in which mechanical N to a height of 5.0 m in a time of 10 s. When machine B
energy is lost are called inelastic collisions. In the real is used to perform the same task it takes 0.1 s. Our instinct
world mechanical energy is always lost during a collision. tells us that machine B is more powerful than machine A.
However, some collisions do approximate quite well to To quantify the concept of power we define power as

62

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 Mechanics

Power = the rate of working

Solution
work-
i.e., power = ------------
time
P P
The unit that is used to measure power is the joule per Using the formula P = Fv, we have that F F= = --- .--v- .
second which is called the watt, (W) after the 19th Century v
3000000
Scottish engineer James Watt. F F= =3000000
Hence, --------------------
--------------------- =- =5050
kNkN
. .
6060

CORE
In the example above, of our two machines, A will have a
power output of 50 W and machine B a power output of
5000 W. Our answer is at best an approximation since the situation
is in fact much more complicated than at first glance.
In the following example some sort of engine is used to The train reaches a maximum speed because as its
pull an object at a constant speed along the horizontal. speed increases the frictional force due to air resistance
also increases. Hence, at its maximum speed all the
energy produced by the motors is used to overcome air
v
resistance, energy lost by friction between wheels and
Engine
track and friction between moving parts of the motors
F and connected parts.
object

Friction Again, we shall see that the concept of power and its
application is discussed in much more detail in Chapter 8
Figure 252 Force Against Friction and also elsewhere in the syllabus.

The pulling force F (which is the tension in the rope)

produced by the engine will be equal to the frictional force 2.3.10 Efficiency
between the object and the floor.
(Machines and efficiencies are discussed in more detail in
Suppose that the engine moves the object a distance ∆s in Chapters 8 and 10).
time ∆t ����������������������������������������������������
. The work done against the frictional force (i.e.,
the work done by the engine) is: ∆W = F ∆s The efficiency of an engine is defined as follows
∆W = F ∆s
WOUT POUT
∆W = F ∆s Eff = =
WIN PIN
The power P developed by the engine is therefore Where WOUT is how much useful work the engine produces
∆W ∆s- and WIN is how much work (energy) is delivered to the
P = ∆ W- = F ⋅P∆
-------
s=
------ -------- = F ⋅ -----
∆ t ∆t engine. The ratio of these two quantities is clearly the same
∆ t ∆ ∆st
∆ W
P = -------- = F ⋅ ------
as the ratio power output of the engine to its power output.
∆s
v = ∆ s-
----- ∆t that ∆t
But, v = ------ hence, we have
∆t
∆ s-t To understand the idea of efficiency, we will look at the
v = ∆
----- P = Fv following example.
∆t

Example Example

A diesel locomotive is pulling a train at its maximum An engine with a power output of 1.2 kW drags an object
speed of 60 m s-1. At this speed the power output of the of weight 1000 N at a constant speed up an inclined plane
engine is 3.0 MW. Calculate the tractive force exerted by that makes an angle of 30° with the horizontal. A constant
the engine. frictional force of 300 N acts between the object and the
plane and the object is dragged a distance of 8.0 m.

F = P--- . F = P
--- . Determine the speed of the object and the efficiency of
v v the engine.
F = P
--
- .
3000000
F = 3000000
---------------------F= =50--------------------
kN60. - = 50 kN
v .
60 63
F = 3000000
--------------------- = 50 kN .
60
070813 Phys chapter 2.indd 63 29/11/2007 1:36:52 PM
 Chapter 2

Solution 2.3.11 S
�olve problems involving,��
�����������������������
work, energy and power
We first need to draw a diagram to visualise the situation.

Examples
E ngine
CORE

P
1000 × sin30° = 500 N
8.0 m h = 8.0 × sin30° = 4.0 m 1. Calculate the momentum of a particle of mass
300 N 1000 N 0.06 kg that has a kinetic energy of 3.2 J.

2. Estimate the minimum take-off power of a

The component of the object’s weight down the plane is 1000 grasshopper (cicada).
× sin30° = 500 N.
3. An elastic band of length 2d is attached to a
The total force against which the machine does work is horizontal board as shown in the diagram below.
therefore 500 + 300 = 800 N.
A margarine tub has some weights attached to
Using P = Fv, we have 1200 = 800 × v the bottom of the inside of the tub such that the
total mass of the weights and the tub is M. The tub
so that v = 1.5 m s-1. is placed at the centre of the band and is pulled
back until the tub makes an angle θ with the
The machine lifts the object to a height h, band as shown. The tub is then released such that
it is projected down the runway for a distance s
where h = 8.0 × sin30° = 4.0 m. before coming to rest. The problem is to deduce an
expression for the speed with which the tub leaves
The useful work that is done by the machine is therefore the band. The force constant of the elastic band is k.
1000 × 4.0 = 4000 J.
4. A railway truck, B, of mass 2000 kg is at rest on
The actual work that is done by the machine is 800 × 8.0 = a horizontal track. Another truck, A, of the same
6400 J. mass moving with a speed of 5.0 m s–1 collides
with the stationary truck and they link up and
The efficiency of the machine is the useful work done divided move off together.
by the actual work done which is
Determine the speed with which the two trucks
4000 - × 100% = 63% .
----------- move off and also the loss of kinetic energy on
6400 collision.
4000 - ×can
-----------
We 100% = 63% . the energy output per second of the
also calculate
6400
fuel used by the machine. The machine has a useful power
output of 1.2 kW and if it is 63% efficient then the fuel must Solutions
produce energy at the rate of 1.2 –1
---------- = 1.9 k J s .
0.63
1.2 –1
---------- = 1.9 k J s . p2
0.63
1 Use E K = we have that
2m

p = 2mEK 2 × 0.06 × 3.2

=
= 0.62 N s

2 Estimates

mass of grasshopper = 2.0 × 10-3 kg

64

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 Mechanics

height to which it jumps 0.50 m 4 It helps to start by drawing a diagram:

time it takes to develop take-off power = 200 ms

Before collision After collision
V
Calculation
A B A B
energy needed to reach 0.50 m = mgh
u1 = 5.0 u2 = 0

CORE
= 2.0 × 10-3 × 10 × 0.50 = 10-2 J
As the trucks couple after the collision, the conservation of
= 0.50 W momentum law states that:

3. In the following example we tie together the ideas m1 u1 + m2 u2 = ( m1 + m2 )V w here, m1 = m2 = 2000 ,

of energy transformations and the work done by a
10000- = 2.5 m s –1.
non-constant force m1 u1 + m2 u2 = ( m1 + m2 )V w here×
2000 ,m5 1+ =0 m = 2( 2000
= 2000 , )V ⇒ V = --------------
+ 2000
4000
2000 for ×the + 0 = ( 2000
5 extension 2000 )V ⇒
of the+elastic mso1 V = 10000 - = 2.5 m1s –1.2000 × 5 2w+h0ere=, m
--------------
2 u2 = ( m1 +---m×2 )V
We first deduce an expression uthat
1 + m4000 1 = m
25000 J 2 = 2000 ,
band. 2
1--- m )V )V ⇒2V = 10000
original position of elastic band
m1 u1 + m2 u2 = ( m1 + × 22000 × 5 2000
2
+w0he=r×e,525000
m+1 0==Jm(22000 =1---2000 + 2000, × - = 2.5 m s –1.
--------------
l 2 × 4000 (2.5 ) = 12500 4000
2
2000 × of5 + 0 m
= u
( + m+2 u2000
1
2000 = )V( m1 + ⇒ 2 mV2 )V= 10000
--------------
- w=h2.5
ere,m 1---ms1–1=. m(25000
=2 2000 ,
M
θ
2d
direction 1 1
--
- × 4000
2
× ( 2.5 ) = 125004000 × 2000 2× 5 + –0 12500)
= 25000 = 12500J J.
θ travel of tub 2 210000
m1 u1× +51 m
2000 ( m21 + 2000
+ 20u2= =( 2000 m2 )V)V ⇒ w , m1 -==m
Vhe=1re-------------- 2 = s –1. ,
m2 2000
--- × 2000 × 5 The
(25000 + 0total
– 12500) KE
= 25000 = before
12500 J collision
J.--- 4000 equals2.5
2 × 4000 × (2.5 ) = 12500
10000- = 2.5 m s –1.
2000 × 5 + 0 = ( 2000 1--- + 2000 )V2 ⇒ V2 = --------------
1 2 × 2000 × 5 + 0 = 25000 4000J(25000 – 12500) = 12500 J.
--- × 4000 × (2.5 )2 = 12500
The stretched length from the geometry of the situation 2 is 1 2
d  ​
equal to l = ​ ____ × 2000
1 The--- total KE ×after 0 = 25000 J
5 2 +collision
sinθ (25000×–24000
--
- 12500)× (= 2.512500) = J.12500equals
2
1 2
The extension, e, is therefore --- × 4000(25000 × (2.5 –) 12500)= 12500 = 12500 J.
2
​  2d  ​– 2d = 2d​ ​ ____
e = 2l – 2d = ____
sinθ sinθ (
1  ​– 1 ​
) So that the (25000 – 12500)
kinetic energy lost=on12500 J. is
collision

The stored elastic energy is therefore (25000 – 12500) = 12500 J.

( (
E​elas​= ​ _12 ​​ke​2​= ​ _12 ​k​​ 2d​ ​ ____
sinθ ))
1  ​– 1 ​  2​​ ​ By lost energy we mean that the energy has been dissipated
to the surroundings. Some of it will be converted into sound
( )
2
= 2k​​d​2​​ ​ ____ 1  ​– 1 ​​ ​ and most will heat up the coupling between the trucks.
sinθ
If we assume that all the energy is transferred to the tub
when the tub is released we have that the kinetic energy of
the tub, E​k , is such that E​k​= E
​ elas
​ ​so that

( sinθ )
1  ​– 1 2​​ ​ ​v2​ ​= ___
​ _12 ​​mv​2​= 2k​​d​2​​ ​ ____ ​ 4k
m  ​​
d​ (
2 ____
​​ ​ ​ 
sinθ
__
)
1  ​– 1 2​​ ​

So that the speed is given by v = 2​ ​ __ √ ( k ____ 1

)
m ​ ​d​ ​ sinθ ​– 1 ​

The above example can form the basis for a useful experiment
in which you can investigate the factors that effect the
distance that the margarine tub will travel.

65

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 Chapter 2

Exercises 2.4 Uniform

Circular
1. Suppose that in Example 4 above that after the
collision truck A and truck B����������������������
do not link and that motion
after the collision, truck A is moving with a speed
of 1 m s–1 and in the same direction as prior to the
CORE

(This topic links with Topics 6.3 and 9.4)

collision. Determine

(i) the speed of truck B after collision 2.4.1 Draw a vector diagram to illustrate that
(ii) the kinetic energy lost on collision the acceleration of a particle moving
with constant speed in a circle is directed
2. A man drags a sack of flour of mass 100 kg at toward the centre of the circle
constant speed up an inclined plane to a height of
6.0 m. The plane makes an angle of 300 with the 2.4.2 Apply the expression for centripetal
horizontal and a constant frictional force of 250 N acceleration.
acts on the sack down the plane.
2.4.3 Identify the force producing circular
(a) Determine the efficiency of the inclined motion in various situations.
plane? Examples include gravitational force
acting on the Moon and friction acting
3. ������������������������������������������������
A car of mass 1000 kg is parked on a level road sideways on the tyres of a car turning a
with its handbrake on. Another car of mass corner.
1500 kg travelling at 10 m s–1 collides into the back
of the stationary car. The two cars move together 2.4.4 Solve problems involving circular motion.
© IBO 2007
after collision in the same straight line. They travel
25m before finally coming to rest.
Problems on banked motion (aircraft and vehicles going
Determine the average frictional force exerted on round banked tracks) will not be included.
the cars as they come to rest.

2.4.1 Circular motion and vector

diagrams

We have mentioned earlier in this chapter that when a

car goes round a circular bend in the road moving with
constant speed it must be accelerating. Acceleration is
a vector and is defined as the rate of change of velocity.
Velocity is also a vector and so it follows that if the direction
of motion of an object is changing then even though its
speed might be constant, its velocity is changing and
hence it is accelerating. A force is needed to accelerate an
object and we might ask what is the origin of the force that
causes the car to go round the bend in the road. Do not
fall into the trap of thinking that this force comes from the
engine. This would imply that if you are on a bicycle then
you can only go round a corner if you keep pedalling. To
understand the origin of the force just think what happens
if the road is icy. Yes, it is this friction between the tyres
and the road that produces the force. If there is no friction
then you cannot negotiate a bend in the road.

66

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 Mechanics

Let us think of the example where you whirl an object tied Centripetal (angular) acceleration
to a string about your head with constant speed. Clearly
the force that produces the circular motion in this case in In this section we shall derive an expression of the
a horizontal plane is the tension in the string. If the string centripetal acceleration of a particle moving with uniform
were to snap then the object would fly off at a tangent to speed v in a circle of radius. You will not be expected to
the circle. This is the direction of the velocity vector of derive this relation in an IB examination; it is given here
the object. The tension in the string acts at right angles for completeness.

CORE
to this vector and this is the prerequisite for an object to
move in a circle with constant speed. If a force acts at right v P v
P X
angles to the direction of motion of an object then there Q h
Q
is no component of force in the direction of motion and d
r
therefore no acceleration in the direction of motion. If the r
force is constant then the direction of the path that the
object follows will change by equal amounts in equal time
intervals hence the overall path of motion must be a circle.
Figure 256 shows the relation between the direction of the
velocity vector and the force acting on a particle P moving
with constant speed in a circular path. Figure 257 Centripetal Acceleration

d 2the
In Figure 238 suppose that – h ) 2 moves
+ ( rparticle = r2 ⇔ d 2 P= to
from 2rh – h 2
v Q v
Q in time ∆t
F P P
∆θ
r
In the absence of a centripetal force the particle would
O O
reach the point X in this time. The force therefore effectively
causes the particle to “fall” a distance h.2rh d2
For=intersecting
chords of a circle we have in this situation
d =
Figure 256 Centripetal Force d2
+ (r = – h )2
⇔ r2 d2
=d 22rh –( vh∆2 t ) 2
h = ----- = ---------------
d2 + ( r – h )2 = r 2 ⇔ d2 = 2r 2rh – 2r h2
The force causing the circular motion is called the centripetal Now suppose 2that we consider
2 a
2 very2
d + ( r – h ) =2 r ⇔ d 2= 2rh small time – hinterval
2
force and this force causes the particle to accelerate d + ( r – h ) = r 2 ⇔ d 2 = 2rh
then h2 will be very small compared to 2rh. Hence we can – h2
d 2 1---+at( r – h ) 2 = rh2 ⇔ 1 = 2rh
towards the centre of the circle and this acceleration is write s = 2 2
=2 --d- a2 ( ∆t) – h2
called the centripetal acceleration. However, be careful to 2 2rh = d 2
2
realise that the centripetal acceleration is always at right ( v2rh∆t ) 2 = d1--- v 2 ( ∆t ) 2
2 ⇒ ------------------ 1---
---------------
2rh = a
d (
2 ∆ t ) a ( ∆t ) 2
angles to the velocity of the particle. If the speed of the 2r 2 2rh = d 2r 2 d = 2v × ∆t .
particle is reduced then it will spiral towards the centre However d is the horizontal
d2 ∆t ) 22 travelled2 in timed ∆t
( vdistance = v × ∆t .
of the circle, accelerating rapidly as it does so. This is in such that d = v∆t. h Hence
= ----- 2rh = ---------------
= d 2 v d = v × ∆t .
2rd 2 ( v2r∆t ) a = ----- d =
effect what happens as an orbiting satellite encounters the h = ----- 2= --------------- 2 r
d ( v ∆ t )
Earth’s atmosphere. h =2r----- = 2r --------------- d 2 ( v ∆t ) 2
2r h2r = ----- = --------------- d = v × ∆t .
1 2 1 2 2r 2r
s = --- at h = ---a ( ∆dt )2 ( v ∆t ) 2
People sometimes talk of a centrifugal force in connection 21 However 2 h is the h2 =
distance
1 ----
- = ---------------
“fallen”
2 in time ∆t
with circular motion. They say something along thes = 2 at
--- h = --- a ( ∆ 2rt ) 2r
1 2( v ∆t ) 2 2 1 v22 ( ∆t ) 21 1--- 2
s = --- at --------------- 1---1-- h- a= -t )a2(⇒
2( ∆-- ∆t )------------------ 2
lines that when a car goes round a bend in the road you So
2 using 2r s 2= 2at 2 h22r= ---2a ( ∆2t )a ( ∆t )
( v ∆t ) 2 1 v ( ∆ t )
2 1
feel a force throwing you outwards and this force is the 1 2 --------------- 2 --- a11( ∆t ) 2 ⇒ 2 ( ∆t ) 2 --- a1( ∆t )
2 ------------------ 2
s = --- at ( v ∆t ) h 2= ------a ( ∆t )2 22 ------------------
2r v2r 2 2
centrifugal force. But there is no such force. All that is 2From which we have2a ( ∆
--------------- v∆ t )t )v⇒ 1 t )t2) 2
--- av( ∆( ∆ 1---
2r a = ----- ---2r
2 --------------- a ( ∆t ) 2 ⇒2 ------------------ a ( ∆t ) 2
happening is that you are moving in accordance with 2r rv 2 2 2 2 2r 2
( v ∆t ) 2 1--- v- ( ∆t ) 1---
Newton’s laws. Before the car entered the bend you were --------------- a ( ∆ta) 2=⇒---- r ------------------
v 2 a ( ∆t ) 2
2r 2 a = ----
-2r 2 v2
moving in a straight line and you still want to keep moving r a = -----
in a straight line. Fortunately the force exerted on you by a So that, 2 r
v
side of the car as you push up against it stops you moving a = ---- -
vr 2
in a straight line. Take the side away and you will continue a = -----
r
moving in a straight line as the car turns the bend.

67

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070813 Phys chapter 2.indd 67
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 Chapter 2

Below are some examples of forces which provide

Example centripetal forces:

d 2 + ( r – h ) 2 = r 2 ⇔ d 2 = 2rh – h 2 1. Gravitational force. This is discussed in detail in

A geo-stationary satellite is one that orbits Earth in the Topic 6.1
24 hours. The orbital radius of the satellite is 4.2 × 107 m.
Calculate the acceleration of the satellite and state the 2. Frictional forces between the wheels of a vehicle
direction of the acceleration. 2(24 hours = 8.64 × 104 s)
CORE

and the ground.

2rh = d
3. Magnetic forces. This force is discussed in Topic 6.3
Solution d = v × ∆t .
d2 ( v ∆t ) 2 Then of course we have the example of objects constrained
h = ----- = --------------- to move in circles by strings or wires attached to the
2r 2r
Let r = the orbital radius and T the period. The speed v of object.
the satellite is then given by
1 2 1 2
s = --- at h = ---a ( ∆t )
2 the acceleration2a is therefore given by 2.4.4 Solve problems involving
( v ∆t ) 2 1--- v 2 ( ∆t ) 2 1--- circular motion
--------------- a ( ∆t ) 2 ⇒ ------------------ a ( ∆t ) 2
d2r 2 π r 2 2r 2
v= =
t T v2
a = -----
r 7 Example
v 2 4π 2 r 40 × 4.2 ×10
a= = 2 = = 0.23 m s-2
r T (8.64) 2 ×10 8
The acceleration will be directed towards the centre of A model airplane of mass 0.25 kg has a control wire of
Earth. length 10.0 m attached to it. Whilst held in the hand of
the controller it flies in a horizontal circle with a speed of
20 m s–1. Calculate the tension in the wire.
2.4.3 Centripetal force
Solution
We can find the expression for the centripetal force F
simply by using Newton’s 2nd law. i.e. F = ma, so that,
The tension in the wire provides the centripetal force and
v2
with a = ----- we have: 2
r ​ m​rv ​
is equal to ____ ​ ​ which in this situation is equal to
2
​ m​rv​ ​​
F = ____
0.25 ×  ​
400 = 10 N.
​ _________
10
where m is the mass of the particle.
An interesting situation arises when we have circular
It is important to realise that the above equation is motion in a vertical plane. Consider a situation in which
effectively Newton’s Second Law as applied to particles you attach a length of string to an object of mass m and
moving in a circle. In order for the particle to move in a then whirl it in a vertical circle of radius r. If the speed of
circle a force must act at right angles to the velocity vector the object is v at its lowest point then the tension in the
of the particle and the speed of the particle must remain 2
constant. This means that the force must also remain ​ m​rv ​
string at this point will be mg + ____ ​ ​ and at the highest
constant 2
​ m​rv ​
point the tension will be mg – ____ ​​
The effect of the centripetal force is to produce an
acceleration towards the centre of the circle. The We now see why this is the case.
magnitude of the particle’s linear velocity and the
magnitude of the force acting on it will determine the
circular path that a particular particle describes.

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 mv2
---------
-.
r mv2
mv2 ---------
-.
---------
-. r
r mv2
Mechanics - = T – mg
---------
r
mv2
mv2 - =TT=– ---------
--------- mg2- + mg
mv
Lowest point: - = T – mg
--------- r
2 r mv2 r
mv Example - = T – mg
---------
- = T – mg
--------- 2 r mv2- + mg
T = ---------
r mv
T = --------- - + mg 2 r
2 r mv - + mg
mv T = ---------
T = --------- - + mg A “wall of death” motorcyclist r rides his motorcycle in a
r mv2
vertical circle of radius 20 m. Calculate ays ---------
the minimum -.
r
speed that he must have at the top of the circle 2
in order to
T mv

CORE
mv2 the loop.
complete ays ---------
-.
ays ----------. 2 r
r mv
mv2 ays --------- -.
ays --------- -. r
mg r Solution mv2- = T + mg , i.e., T = --------- mv2- – mg
---------
r r
Figure 258 Lowest Point mv 2 mv 2
mv2- = T + mg , i.e., T = ---------
--------- mv2- – mg--------- - = T + mg , i.e., T = --------- - – mg
2 r 2 r
r mv r mv
The resultant force on mass, mv2-m=/ kg,
---------
throughout its motion
T +2 mgmv , i.e., T mv mv2in- –r mg
= 2---------
- = T + mg , i.e., T = ---------
--------- - – mg
mg
a circle (as long as the speed
2 r
r is constant)
mv is always
---------
-. ---------
- .r R
---------
-. r r
r
Taking the positive direction to be towards the centre of the
circle, at its lowest point, the resultant force is provided by
the expression T – mg, so that
mv2 mv 2
mv2 --------- - = T ---------
– mg
- = Tr – mg r - = T – mg
---------
r Let R be the reaction force on the bike, then we need to
T mv2- + mgmv2
2 = ---------
That is,
T = ---------mv - + mgr T = ---------
- + mg
r mv2
r use the expression --------- - = R + mg (when the bike is at
Highest point: r
its highest point). mv2
mv2 - = R + mg
---------
- = R + mg
--------- 2 r
2 r mv
mv2 mv 2 - = R + mg ---------
- =mv R2+ mgHowever, the bike must always make contact with the track,
2
mvays --------- mv ---------
- . ays --------- r ---------
-.
ays ---------
-. r- . mg
r r r that is, we must have that R ≥ 0.
r
T mv2
R = --------- - – mg
Now, re-arranging the expression we have that r
mv 22 mv2- mv2
mv---------
- – mg ≥ 0 ⇒ --------- ≥ mg R = --------- - – mg
mv 2 2 mv 2 mv 2 2 R = --------- - – mg 2 , however, as R ≥ 0, we have that
r
mv 2 mv
- – mg --------- = T – mg rr mv r
- = T ---------
---------
- = Tr + mg , i.e.,
+ mg
- =, i.e., T +mv T =, i.e.,
mg ---------
- – mgr T = --------- - –- mg mv2 R = --------- - – mg
r T = --------- r r r
2 R = 2 ---------
- – mg mv 2 r 2- ≥ mg . So, the minimum
mv mv 2
mv mv r mg ---------
- – mg ≥ 0 ⇒ --------- v 2- speed - will
--------- g
--------- – mg
- mv 2 ≥ 0 ⇒ --------- - ≥ 2 r r g = ----
Figure 259 r Highest Point
- +mv 2 r mv r r v 2-
mv 2 mvT2- = --------- r
mg- – mg ≥ 0 ⇒ ---------
--------- - ≥ mg v 2
2g = ----
- – mg ≥ 0 ⇒
--------- --------- ≥ mg r r be given by g = ----- since at any lower mv
speed mg will
r be
r r mv2 r ---------
-
Again, we have that the resultant force on mass, m / kg, ---------
- r
2 speed is r mv2
throughout its motion in a circle (as long asmv the greater than --------- - and the motor bike will leave the track.
---------
- r
2 r
constant) is always --------- mv So in this case the speed will be 14 m s-1.
mv- .2
ays r--------- -.
r
Taking the positive direction to be towards the centre of the It is also worthwhile noting that in circular motion with
circle, at its highest point, the resultant force is provided by constant speed, there is no change in kinetic energy. This is
the expression T + mg, so that because the speed, v, is constant and so the expression for
mv 2 the kinetic energy, -₂�¹� mv2, is also always constant (anywhere
- = T – mv
--------- mg2 mv 2
2r - = T + mg , i.e., T = ---------
--------- - – mg along its motion). Another way to look at this is that since
- = R mv + mg - = R + mgr
+ mg ---------
r
r the force acts at right angles to the particle then no work is
mv2- + mg
T = --------- done on the particle by the force.
r

2 2
mv2 mv R 2 = mv - – mgmv - – mg
---------
ays ----------. R = --------- - – mgr R = ---------
r
r r 69
mv - 2 2 v 2-
⇒mg---------
≥ ≥⇒
0
mv -
mg--------- ≥ mg v 2g = ---- v 2-
g = ----
≥ mgr r g = ----
- r r
070813 Phys chapter 2.indd 69
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2
 Chapter 2

7. A sphere of mass m, attached to an inextensible

Exercises string as shown in the diagram is released from
rest at an angle θ with the vertical. When the
sphere passes through its lowest point, show that
1. An object is travelling at a constant speed of the tension in the string is given by mg (3 - 2cosθ)
40 ms-1 in a circular path of radius 80 m.
Calculate the acceleration of the object?
CORE

2. A body of mass 5.0 kg, lying on a horizontal θ

smooth table attached to an inextensible string of l
length 0.35 m, while the other end of the string is
fixed to the table. The mass is whirled at a constant
speed of 2.0 ms-1. Calculate
m kg
(a) the centripetal acceleration.
(b) the tension in the string.
(c) the period of motion.
8. A 3 kg mass attached to a string 6 m long is to
3. The radius of the path of an object in uniform be swung in a circle at a constant speed making
circular motion is doubled. The centripetal
������������������
force one complete revolution in 1.25 s. Determine the
needed if its speed remains the same is value that the breaking strain that the string must
not exceed if the string is not to break when the
A. half as great as before. circular motion is in
B. the same as before.
C. twice as great as before. (a) a horizontal plane?
D. four times as great as before. (b) a vertical plane?

4. A car rounds a curve of radius 70 m at a speed of 9. A mass, m kg, is released from point A, down a
12 m s-1 on a level road. Calculate its centripetal smooth inclined plane and once it reaches point B,
acceleration? it completes the circular motion, via the smooth
circular track B to C to D and then back through
5. A 500 g sphere is hung from an inextensible string B, which is connected to the end of the incline and
1.25 m long and swung around to form a ‘conical has a radius a / m.
pendulum’. The sphere moves in a circular
horizontal path of radius 0.75 m. Determine the A
tension in the string.
D

4a
a
C

1.25 m B

Determine the normal reaction of the track on the mass

at (a) D. (b) C. (c) B.

0.75 m

6. Determine the maximum (constant) speed at

which a car can safely round a circular curve of
radius 50 m on a horizontal road if the coefficient
of static friction (μ) between the tyres and the road
is 0.7. (Use g = 10 m s–2). (HINT: if the normal
reaction is N, the relationship is F = μ N)

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 Mechanics

Miscellaneous questions on Topic 2

Topic 2.1 Topic 2.2
1. Sketch the distance-time, speed-time, velocity- 1. An object is thrown through the air. Ignoring air
time and acceleration-time for a free fall resistance, draw a free body diagram of the forces

CORE
parachutist from the time that she leaves the acting on the ball whilst it is in flight.
aeroplane to the time that she lands on the
ground. (Remember that she does not open a 2. An object of weight 50 N is suspended vertically
parachute until some time after jumping from the by two strings as shown
aeroplane).

2. The graph below shows the idealised velocity-time

graph for a car pulling away from one set of traffic
lights until it is stopped by the next set.
60°

25

20
The strings are of the same length and the angle between
–1
speed / m s

15 them is 60°. Draw a free body diagram of the forces acting

on the object. Calculate the tension in the strings.
10
3. When a person stands on bathroom scales the
5
scale reads 60 kg. Suppose the person stands
on the same scales when in an elevator (lift).
0
0 20 40 60 80 100 120 140 time / s The elevator accelerates upwards at 2.0 m s-2.
Determine the new reading on the scale.
Calculate the
4. The diagram shows two blocks connected by a
i. acceleration of the car between 0 and 20 s string that passes over a pulley.
and between 120 and 130 s.
ii. total distance travelled by the car during
braking. B
iii. total distance between the traffic lights.

3. A person drops a stone down a water well and

hears a splash 2.0 s after it leaves his hand.
Determine the depth of the well (g = 10 m s-2) A

4. A girl throws a stone vertically upwards. The

stone leaves her hand with a speed of 15.0 m s–1. Block A has a mass of 2.0 kg and block B a mass of 4.0 kg
Determine (i) the maximum height reached by and rests on a smooth table.
the stone and (ii) how long the time it takes to
return to the ground after leaving her hand Determine the acceleration of the two blocks?
(g = 10 m s-2)
5. Here are four statements about a book resting on a
table.

A. The book exerts a force on the table.

B. The table exerts a force on the book.
C. the book exerts a force on the Earth.
D. the Earth exerts a force on the book.

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 Chapter 2

Which forces form a pair of forces as described by it falls through a height of 2.5 m before striking
Newton’s Third Law? the top of the pile. It stays in contact with the pile
and drives it a distance of 0.40 m into the ground.
6. When a golfer strikes a golf-ball it is in contact Calculate the average force exerted by the ground
with the club head for about 1 ms and the ball on the pile by using
leaves the club head with a speed of about
70 m s‑1. If the mass of the ball is 50 g estimate the i. energy considerations
CORE

maximum accelerating force exerted on the golf ii. the equations of uniform motion and
ball, stating any assumptions that you make. Newton’s Second Law. (assume that the
mass of the pile driver is much greater than
7 A ball of mass 0.1 kg is dropped from a height of the mass of the pile.)
2.0 m onto a hard surface. It rebounds to a height
of 1.5 m and it is in contact with the surface for 2. A man slides a box of mass 50 kg at constant speed
0.05 s. Calculate the up an inclined slope to a height of 2.0 m. The slope
makes an angle of 30° with the horizontal and
i. speed with which it strikes the surface. it takes him 4 s to reach the height of 2.0 m and
ii. speed with which it leaves the surface. a constant frictional force of 250 N acts on the
iii. change in momentum of the ball. block.
iv. impulse given to the ball on contact with
the surface. Calculate
v. average force that the surface exerts on the
ball. i. the work the man does against friction
ii. the work the man does against gravity
8 A bullet of mass 0.02 kg is fired into a block of iii. the efficiency of the “man-slope machine”
wood of mass 1.5 kg resting on a horizontal table. iv. the power the man develops to push the
The block moves off with an initial speed of block up the slope
8.0 m s-1. Estimate the speed with which the bullet
strikes the block. 3. This question is about calculating the power output
of a car engine. Here is some data about a car that
9 The bullet in question 8 is fired from a rifle of mass travels along a level road at a speed of 25 m s-1.
2.5 kg. Assuming that the bullet leaves the barrel
of the rifle with the speed calculated above, find Fuel consumption = 0.20 litre km-1
the recoil speed of the rifle if it is free to move. In
reality the rifle is held and for a certain person the Calorific value of the fuel = 5.0 × 106 J litre-1
rifle recoils a distance of 0.12 m. Determine the
average force that the person exerts on the rifle? Engine efficiency 50%

Topic 2.3 Determine:

1. The diagram shows a pile driver that is used to i. the rate at which the engine consumes fuel
ii. the rate at which the fuel supplies energy
iii. the power output of the engine
pile driver
iv. the power used to overcome the frictional
forces acting on the car
v. the average frictional force acting on the
car.
pile
Explain why:
ground
(i) the power supplied by the engine is not all
used to overcome friction
(ii) the fuel consumption increases as the speed
drive a metal bar (the pile) into the ground.A of the car increases
particular pile driver has a mass of 500 kg and

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