A car slams on its brakes, coming to a complete stop in 4 sec. The car was traveling north at 60 mph. Calculate the acceleration
60 mph = 88 ft/s
acceleration = (change in V)/(time) =
(88 ft/s)/4s = 22 ft/s^2
That is about (2/3) g
The acceleration DIRECTION is south, in case they want to know that too
To calculate the acceleration of the car, we first need to convert the initial speed from mph to m/s.
1 mph is equal to 0.44704 m/s.
So, the initial speed of the car can be calculated as follows:
Initial speed = 60 mph * 0.44704 m/s per mph
Initial speed = 26.8224 m/s
Next, we need to calculate the final speed, which is zero since the car comes to a complete stop.
Final speed = 0 m/s
The acceleration can be determined using the formula:
Acceleration = (Final speed - Initial speed) / Time
In this case, the final speed is 0 m/s, the initial speed is 26.8224 m/s, and the time taken to stop is 4 seconds.
Now we can plug these values into the formula to calculate the acceleration:
Acceleration = (0 m/s - 26.8224 m/s) / 4 s
Acceleration = -26.8224 m/s / 4 s
Acceleration = -6.7056 m/s²
Therefore, the acceleration of the car is approximately -6.7056 m/s². The negative sign indicates that the car is decelerating or slowing down in the north direction.