NOTES Chapter Three - 1D Dynamics

Contents:
1.
2.
3.
4.

Forces
Newtons Laws
Friction
Force of gravity

1. Forces.
What is a force?
A force is anything that can:

Cause a change to objects.

Move or stop an object.
Change the direction of a moving object
Be used to push or pull things.

Examples of Forces:
1. Gravitational force
2. Electric force

3. Electromagnetic force

4. Magnetic force

5. Friction

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6. Tension force

7. Normal force

Free Body Diagram:

Force of gravity or weight: Always draw it down.
Tension: A pull force from a rope.
Friction: Always tries to make objects stop. It Is PARALLEL with the sliding surfaces.
Action force: From a person or a machine.
Normal force (reaction force): The force a surface holding an object up. It is PERPENDICULAR
to the surface.

Example 1: A girl is suspended motionless from the ceiling by two ropes.

Example 2: An egg is free-falling from a nest in a tree. Neglect air resistance.

Example 3: flying squirrel is gliding (no wing flaps) from a tree to the ground at constant
velocity. Consider air resistance.

Example 4: rightward force is applied to a book in order to move it across a desk with a
rightward acceleration. Consider frictional forces. Neglect air resistance.

Example 5: A skydiver is descending with a constant velocity. Consider air resistance.

Note: Remember that a negative sign means the force acts in the opposite direction to the one
that you choose to be positive.

P r a c t I c e:

In each of the following situations, represent the object with a dot. Draw and label all the forces
using standard force symbols.
1.Object lies motionless on a surface

2. Object slides at constant speed along a smooth

(frictionless) surface.

3. Object slows due to friction (rough surface).

4. Object slides on a smooth incline.

5. Friction on an incline prevents sliding.

6. An Object is suspended from the ceiling.

7. The object is falling (no air resistance).

8. The object is falling at constant (terminal) velocity.

9. The rocket is accelerating straight up.

Balanced and unbalanced forces:

Balanced forces are the forces in equal and opposite directions.
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Unbalanced force can cause an object to move, stop moving, or change direction.
Net force is the total force on an object

Finding the resultant force:

The resultant force is the sum of the vectors. =
When net force = 0, forces are balanced and the object is in equilibrium.
Example#1: Two people push on a box from opposite sides with forces of 4 N and 6 N
respectively as shown in the figure.
Solution: assume that the positive direction is to the right, then:
= - = (+6N) + (-4N) = 2N
= 2N to the left
Example # 2: A car (mass 1200 Kg) applies a force of 2000 N on a trailer (mass 250Kg).
A friction force of 200 N is acting on the trailer, and 300 N is acting on the car.
1. Draw a force diagram of all the forces acting on the car.
2. Draw a free body diagram of the horizontal forces acting on the trailer.
3. Use the force diagram to determine the resultant force on the trailer.

Key Concepts:
A Force is a push or a pull.
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Vectors show the magnitude and direction of forces.

The magnitude or strength of a force is measured in a unit called a Newton (N).
The total force on an object after all forces are added is called the net force.
Unbalanced forces cause objects to start moving, stop moving or change directions.
Balanced forces acting on an object do not change an objects motion.
Continue to move at constant velocity unless acted upon by an unbalanced force.

2. Newtons Laws
Newton's First Law: (Inertia)
An object will remain in a state of rest or continue travelling at constant velocity, unless acted
upon by an unbalanced (net) force.
Inertia is every object resistance to change its motion

For example:
1- Suppose that you filled a baking dish to the rim with water and walked around an oval track
making an attempt to complete a lap in the least amount of time. The water would have a
tendency to spill from the container during specific locations on the track. In general the water
spilled when:

the container was at rest and you attempted to move it

the container was in motion and you attempted to stop it
the container was moving in one direction and you attempted to change
its direction.
The water spills whenever the state of motion of the container is changed.
The water resisted this change in its own state of motion. The water tended to "keep on doing
what it was doing." The container was moved from rest to a high speed at the starting line; the
water remained at rest and spilled onto the table. The container was stopped near the finish line;
the water kept moving and spilled over container's leading edge. The container was forced to
move in a different direction to make it around a curve; the water kept moving in the same
direction and spilled over its edge. The behavior of the water during the lap around the track can
be explained by Newton's first law of motion.

2- Have you ever experienced inertia (resisting changes in your state of motion) in an automobile
while it is braking to a stop?
The force of the road on the locked wheels provides the unbalanced force to change the
car's state of motion, yet there is no unbalanced force to change your own state of motion.
Thus, you continue in motion, sliding along the seat in forward motion. A person in
motion stays in motion with the same speed and in the same direction ... unless acted
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upon by the unbalanced force of a seat belt. Yes! Seat belts are used to provide safety for
passengers whose motion is governed by Newton's laws. The seat belt provides the
unbalanced force that brings you from a state of motion to a state of rest. Perhaps you
could speculate what would occur when no seat belt is used.
Newton's Second Law:
If a resultant force acts on a body, it will cause the body to accelerate in the direction of the
resultant force. The acceleration of the body will be directly proportional to the resultant force
and indirectly proportional to the mass of the body.
F = ma

Example 1: If you drop a 15kg bowling ball with a force of 147N, what is the acceleration of the
ball?

Example 2: A person throws a baseball at an acceleration of 25m/s2 with a 12.5N force. What is
of the ball?

Example 3: A 10 kg box is placed on a table. A horizontal force of 32 N is applied

to the box. A frictional force of 7 N is present between the surface and the box.
1. Draw a force diagram indicating all the horizontal forces acting on the box.

2. Calculate the acceleration of the box.

the mas

Example 4: Two crates, 10 kg and 15 kg respectively, are connected with a thick rope according
to the diagram. A force of 500 N is applied. The boxes move with an acceleration of 2 m/s2. One
third of the total frictional force is acting on the 10 kg block and two thirds on the 15 kg block.
Calculate:
Fa =500N
15 kg
1. The magnitude and direction of the frictional force present.
10kg

3. The magnitude of the tension in the rope at T.

Practice:
1- What is the rate of acceleration of a 2,000-kilogram truck if a force of 4,200 N is used to
make it start moving forward?
2- What is the acceleration of a 0.30 kilogram ball that is hit with a force of 25 N?
3- How much force is needed to accelerate a 68 kilogram-skier at a rate of 1.2 m/sec2?
4- What is the mass of an object that requires a force of 30 N to accelerate at a rate of 5
m/sec2?
5- What is the force on a 1,000 kilogram-elevator that is falling freely under the acceleration of
gravity only?
6- What is the mass of an object that needs a force of 4,500 N to accelerate it at a rate of 5
m/sec2
7- What is the acceleration of a 6.4 kilogram bowling ball if a force of 12 N is applied to it?

Newton's Third Law:

If body A exerts a force on body B, then body B exerts a force of equal

magnitude on body A, but in the opposite direction.

1. If forces are always equal and opposite in action and reaction, how is it possible
for an object to accelerate?
Answer: Isolate the two objects and consider one at a time. Analyze what forces are
acting on each of the objects independent of each other. Only these forces are
involved in the acceleration of an object.

2. Explain, in detail, using the third law of motion, how a person is able to walk
forward.

Answer: The walker must push off from the ground with both a downward and
backward push to the ground from their feet. The opposite force (forward and
upward) is returned back to the person from the ground, so the person walks
forward.

3. There is a classic problem that physicists like to ask students. A horse is pulling a
carriage on a level ground. The horse knows the third law of motion. He tells the
carriage that he will exert a force forward, and the carriage will exert a force
equal to the horse's force but in opposite directions. Therefore, the horse
explained, he can never pull the carriage forward. Can you explain to the horse
that he is mistaken? How is he able to pull the carriage forward?
Answer: The equal and opposite forces referred to in Newton's third law of
motion are acting on different objects. The horse will pull on the cart and the cart
will pull on the horse. The cart will have an unbalanced net force acting on it (if
neglecting friction) and would accelerate

3. Friction:

Symbol: Ff
Units: Newtons (its a force!)
Depends on: -Weight of object (normal force)
-Nature of the surfaces between the moving object and the supporting surface

Two types:
o Static friction (pushing the piano but no motion)
o Sliding (kinetic) friction (piano moves!!!)
o Static force > kinetic force

Formula:

Ff = FN
where = coefficient of friction (values usually between 0 and 1)
Note: Low = slippery and High = sticky
FN = normal force dependent on weight vector
Example: If it takes 200N to move a 100 kg box across a flat floor at constant speed, what is the
coefficient of friction ()?
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Practice:
1- Suppose that the captain of flying purple plane (mass 2.75x105kg) announced that the plane
is flying east at a constant speed of 900 km/hr and that the combined thrust of the four
engine is a constant 80000N.
a) What is the acceleration of the airplane? (answer: 0 m/s2)
b) What is the net force acting on the plane? (answer: 0N)
c) What is the force of friction acting on the airplane? (answer: -80000N)
2- Gary is pushing a filing cabinet across the floor with a force of 228N. If the cabinet has a
mass of 58kg and the coefficient of friction , between the floor and cabinet is 0.38.
b- What is the weight of the filing cabinet?
(answer: 569N)
c- What is the force of friction on the cabinet?
(answer: 216N)
d- What is the net force acting on the cabinet?
(answer: 12N)
e- What is the acceleration of the cabinet?
(answer: 0.207m/s2)
3- Billy is pushing a cabinet of weight 400 N across the floor, but because the cabinet is made
of different material, is now is 0.5 between the cabinet and floor. If Billy is pushing with
215N of force.
1. What is the force of friction acting on the cabinet? (answer: 200N)
2. What is the net force on the cabinet? (answer: 15N)
3. What is the mass of the cabinet? (answer: 40.8kg)
4. What is the acceleration of the cabinet? (answer: 0.368m/s2)
5. If he started from rest, how fast would the cabinet be moving if he
pushed it from rest for 30 seconds? (answer: 11m/s)
6. If he started from rest, how far would the cabinet move if he pushed it
for 30 seconds? (answer: 166m)
4. Force of gravity:
Law of Universal Gravitation: Gravity acts between all objects in the universe.
The force of gravity between objects increases with greater mass and decreases with greater
distance.

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The force of gravity between objects is:

Fg =

1 2
2

(Where G is the universal gravitational constant= 6.67x 10-11 Nm2/kg2)

MEarth = 5.98 x 1024kg
MMoon = 6.35 x 1022kg
REarth = 6.38 x 106kg
Note: Weight is the force of gravity on an object at the surface of the Earth.

Example1: Calculate the weight of a 50.0 kg on the moon using Newtons Law of Universal
Gravitation. The mass of the moon is approximately 7.36 x 1022 kg, the radius is 1.738x106m.

Example2: Find the force of gravity between two physics students that have masses kg and kg if they
are sitting 1m apart.

Example3: What is the force of gravity on a 0.75kg ball sitting on the ground?
Practice:
1- A 1450 kg spacecraft is drifting in space. The force of gravity between it and the Earth is 3860 N.
a) How far is it from the center of the Earth? (Answer: r = 1.22 x 107m)
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b) How far is it above the surface of the Earth? (Earth radius = 6.38x106m)
(Answer: r = 5.8 x 106m)
2-What would happen to the force of gravity on the spacecraft in question #2 if the distance between
the spacecraft and the center of the Earth was: a) Tripled? B) Halved
3-What is the force of gravity on a 24.0 kg table sitting on the Earth? (Answer: Fg = 235N)

4- If the weight of a classroom Physics textbook is 42 N, what is the books mass? (Answer: m = 4.3kg)
5-If the textbook in question #4 was taken to the Moon, would its mass and/or weight change?
6-What is the Earths gravitational field strength g at the top of Mt. Everest, which is 8400 m above
sea level? (Answer: g = 9.77m/s2)
7-What is the size of the force of gravity between the Earth and the Sun? A distance of 1.50x1011 m
separates them. (Answer: Fg = 3.52 x 1022 N)
8- A 7.6kg object is resting on a horizontal surface. What is the normal force on the object? (Answer: Fn=
74N)
9- A 7.6 kg object is pulled along a horizontal surface. If the coefficient of friction is 0.20, what is the
force of friction? (Answer: Ff= 15N)
10- A 1250 kg car travelling at 60.0 km/h comes to a sudden stop in 35m. What is the coefficient of
friction acting on the brakes? (Answer: = 0.40)

Elevator Problems:
Let's look at several cases. We will assume that up is the positive direction and down is the negative
direction.

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Case 1: No acceleration of elevator

If the acceleration of the elevator is zero, then there are two possible scenarios; the elevator can
be at rest (stationary, zero velocity) or moving with a constant speed (no acceleration if velocity
does not change).
In this case, the action and reaction force pair between the person and the scale is just the
weight. The person pushes down on the scale with a force of -W=-mg (negative direction) and the
scale pushes back up against the man with a Normal Force of FN = +W = +mg. Because the reading
on the scale is the magnitude of the normal force, the scale will read the true weight when the
elevator is NOT accelerating.
Case 2: going up & speeding up (acceleration a is positive (up))
In this case, the elevator and the person are starting from rest at a lower floor. The elevator
accelerates upward. The inertia of the person would prefer to stay stationary, so the elevator
floor and scale must push up on the person to accelerate him upward along with the elevator.
(The person doesn't sink into the floor when the elevator accelerates up. The elevator and the
scale and the person all move together.)
The scale therefore has to push upward with extra force on the person to accelerate the
person's mass upward. This results in a greater contact force between the scale and the
person. Therefore the Normal Force is larger, so the reading on the scale is a number that is
GREATER than the true weight.
Let's consider Newton's 2nd Law (F=ma) acting on the person. The overall acceleration of the person is
upward (with the elevator). So ma is positive (upward). The only external for acting on the person are
the force of gravity acting down (-W=-mg) and the supporting Normal Force FN that the scale applies
upward on the person. So F=ma= -mg+FN . We want to know FN because that is the number that we
read off the scale. FN =mg + ma, which is GREATER than the true weight.
Case 3: going up & slowing down (acceleration a is negative (down))
In this case, the elevator and the person are initially moving upward at a constant speed
and slowing down to rest at a higher floor. The acceleration of the elevator is downward
(opposite to the upward motion, which causes a reduction of the velocity). The inertia of
the person would prefer to keep moving upward at a constant speed, so the elevator floor
and scale effectively drop out a little bit from underneath the person as the elevator slows
down.
The person doesn't float upward, because again the elevator and the person move
together, but the contact force between the person and the scale is reduced. The scale
therefore has to push upward with less force on the person to support the person's weight.
Therefore the Normal Force is smaller, so the reading on the scale is a number that is LESS than the true
weight.
Let's consider Newton's 2nd Law (F=ma) acting on the person. The overall acceleration of the person is
downward (with the elevator). So ma is negative (downward). The only external forces acting on the
person are the force of gravity acting down (-W=-mg) and the supporting Normal Force FN that the scale
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applies upward on the person. So F= -ma= -mg + FN. We want to know FN because that is the number
that we read off the scale. FN=mg - ma, which is LESS than the true weight.
Case 4: going down & slowing down (acceleration a is positive (up))
In this case, the elevator and the person are initially moving downward at a constant
speed and then slow to rest at a lower floor. The elevator accelerates upward (opposite
direction to negative/downward velocity to reduce velocity magnitude). The inertia of
the person would prefer to keep moving downward at the constant speed, so the
elevator floor and scale must push up on the person to accelerate him upward, slowing
him down. (The person doesn't sink into the floor here either. Elevator and scale and
person move together.) The scale therefore has to push upward with extra force on the
person to accelerate the person's mass upward. This results in a greater contact force
between the scale and the person. Therefore the Normal Force is larger, so the reading
on the scale is a number that is GREATER than the true weight.
Let's consider Newton's 2nd Law (F=ma) acting on the person. The overall acceleration of the
person is upward (with the elevator). So ma is positive (upward). The only external forces acting on the
person are the force of gravity acting down (-W=-mg) and the supporting Normal Force FN that the scale
applies upward on the person. So F=ma= -mg+FN . (Note that this is the same equation as we got in
case 2.) We want to know FN because that is the number that we read off the scale. FN =mg+ma, which
is GREATER than the true weight.
Case 5: going down & speeding up (acceleration a is negative (down))
In this case, the elevator and the person are initially at rest at a higher floor. The elevator then
speeds up in the downward direction towards a lower floor. The elevator acceleration of the elevator is
negative/downward (increasing the velocity magnitude in the downward direction). The inertia of the
person would prefer to stay at rest, so the elevator floor and scale effectively drop out
a little bit from underneath the person as the elevator accelerates down.
The person doesn't float upward here also, because again the elevator and the
person move together, but the contact force between the person and the scale is
reduced. The scale therefore has to push upward with less force on the person to
support the person's weight. Therefore the Normal Force is smaller, so the reading on
the scale is a number that is LESS than the true weight.
Let's consider Newton's 2nd Law (F=ma) acting on the person. The overall
acceleration of the person is downward (with the elevator). So ma is negative
(downward). The only external forces acting on the person are the force of gravity acting down (-W=mg) and the supporting Normal Force FN that the scale applies upward on the person. So F= -ma= mg+FN . (Note that this is the same equation that we got for Case 3.) We want to know FN because that
is the number that we read off the scale. FN =mg - ma, which is LESS than the true weight.

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Case 6: freefall (a = -g)

If the elevator cable were to break, the whole elevator-scale-person system would
all begin to accelerate downward due to the force of gravity. All objects in freefall
accelerate downward with the same magnitude (acceleration due to gravity, g). The scale
and the person are freefalling together, so there is NO contact force (Normal Force)
between the scale and the person. (When they are both falling together, there is no way
that the scale can support any of the person's weight.)
Note that this is a special case of downward acceleration, which we discussed in
Case 3 and Case 5. Just as in Cases 3 and 5, the apparent weight (which is zero when a=-g) is
less than the true weight

Example1: Larry is in an elevator that is moving downward at a constant velocity of 4.2 m/s. His
mass is 105kg. What is his weight and apparent weight?
Example 2: A lamp hangs vertically from a cord in an elevator which is descending with an
downward acceleration of a=2.00m/s2. The tension in the cord is FT=10.0N. What is the mass m
of this lamp?
Practice:
1- Tom is in an elevator that is accelerating upward at 0.55 m/s2. His mass is 75 kg. What is his
weight and apparent weight? (Answer: Weight = 735N, Apparent weight= 777N)
2-Jean is in an elevator that is accelerating downward at 1.25 m/s2. Her mass is 65 kg. What is
her weight and apparent weight? (Answer: Weight = 638N, Apparent weight= 556N)
3-Roy is in an elevator that is moving upward at a constant velocity of 2.5 m/s. His mass is 87.5
kg. What is his weight and apparent weight? (Answer: Weight = 858N, Apparent weight= 858N)

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4-John is traveling down a country road at 19.5 m/s when he goes up and over a small hump in
the road that has a curvature (radius) of 55 m. His mass is 79 kg. What is his weight and apparent
weight? (Answer: Weight = 775N, Apparent weight= 229N)

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