Answer #123

Part 1:

The answer is (b): 1.41 seconds, as can be seen by clicking your mouse on the photograph below. (Pretty good for an old air track!)

The equation to determine how far an accelerated body moves as a function of time is:

where a is the acceleration.

The time for the accelerating body M to move the distance D between the two photocell gates due to the gravitational force on m<<M is given by:

where g is the acceleration of gravity. Substituting D/2 for D yields t = t₀/sqrt(2) or approximately 1.41 seconds.

Part 2:

The answer is (b): 1.41 seconds, as can be seen by clicking your mouse on the photograph below. (Well, it's a bit slow, but that's experimental physics!)

The equation to determine how far an accelerated body moves as a function of time is:

where a is the acceleration.

The time for the accelerating body M to move the distance D between the two photocell gates due to the gravitational force on m is given by:

where g is the acceleration of gravity. Substituting 2m for m yields t = t₀/sqrt(2) or approximately 1.41 seconds.

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