A Honda Civic and Lincoln Town Car are initially at rest on a horizontal parking lot at the edge of steep cliff. The Town Car has twice as much mass as the Civic. Equal constant forces are applied to each car and they accelerate across equal distances (ignore effects of friction.) When they reach the far end of the lot the force is suddenly removed, whereupon they sail through the air and crash on the ground below.
1.) Which car has the larger impulse imparted to it by the applied force? Explain your answer.
**I think the Town’s Car because impulse=ft, so that would mean that since the Lincoln Car has twice the mass of the Civic, it has more impulse. **
2.) Which car has the greatest momentum at the cliffs edge? Explain your answer.
**The Town Car because the bigger the mass of an object, the more momentum it has. **
3.) Which car has the greater work done on it by the applied force? Explain your answer in terms of distance traveled.
**I think the Town car does because the more kinetic energy something has the more force is applied to it. Since the Town car is traveling a larger distance and it has more kinetic energy, it requires more energy to stop it, so more force is applied.**
1. Sort of. The town car is heavier, so its acceleration is a=F/m, so the acceleration is lower, so more time is spent on the ground. Impulse=F*time
2. momentumchange=impulsechange. See 1.
Your explanation is off target.
3. Think!. work done= force*distance, which is the same for each.
1.) Your answer is partially correct. Impulse is indeed equal to the product of force and time (impulse = force * time), but it is also equal to the change in momentum. Since the force applied to both cars is the same and they accelerate across equal distances, the time taken to reach the end of the lot will also be the same for both cars.
Since impulse is equal to the change in momentum, and momentum is equal to mass multiplied by velocity, we can see that the car with greater mass will experience a larger change in momentum due to the same applied force and time. Therefore, the Lincoln Town Car, with twice the mass of the Honda Civic, will have the larger impulse imparted to it by the applied force.
2.) Your answer is correct. Momentum is defined as the product of mass and velocity (momentum = mass * velocity). At the cliff's edge, both cars are initially at rest, so their velocities are zero. However, since the Town Car has twice the mass of the Civic, it will have the greater momentum at the cliff's edge.
3.) Your answer is incorrect. The work done on an object is equal to the product of force and displacement (work = force * displacement * cos(angle)), not the kinetic energy. In this scenario, the applied force is the same for both cars, but the distance traveled is equal for both, as stated in the question.
Since the force and distance are the same for both cars, the work done on both cars by the applied force will be equal. The work done is independent of the mass or velocity of the object. Therefore, both the Honda Civic and the Lincoln Town Car will have the same amount of work done on them by the applied force.