- #1
mateomy
- 307
- 0
I was doing some problems out of my book and the following problem has been solved, but a little question popped up in my head. Its simply conceptual, just want to gain a deeper and truer understanding of these two fundamental ideas...
The problem goes something like this...(easy one)...Attempting to stop on a slippery road, a car moving at 80 km/h skids across the road at a 30 (degree) angle to its initial motion, coming to a stop in 3.9s. Determine the average acceleration in m/s^2, using a coordinate system with the x-axis in the direction of the car's original motion and the y-axis toward the side of the road to which the car skids.
The answer that I stumbled upon AFTER having figured out the individual components of the resultant vector is; 5.69 m/s^2.My question is: Why is it that we only take into account the acceleration coming from the x coordinate? The car doesn't stay simply along the x-axis as is noticed from the 30(degree) "skid" it makes across the road.
Shouldn't the average acceleration be figured from the resultant vector? Or is the book just leaving out specifics?
The problem goes something like this...(easy one)...Attempting to stop on a slippery road, a car moving at 80 km/h skids across the road at a 30 (degree) angle to its initial motion, coming to a stop in 3.9s. Determine the average acceleration in m/s^2, using a coordinate system with the x-axis in the direction of the car's original motion and the y-axis toward the side of the road to which the car skids.
The answer that I stumbled upon AFTER having figured out the individual components of the resultant vector is; 5.69 m/s^2.My question is: Why is it that we only take into account the acceleration coming from the x coordinate? The car doesn't stay simply along the x-axis as is noticed from the 30(degree) "skid" it makes across the road.
Shouldn't the average acceleration be figured from the resultant vector? Or is the book just leaving out specifics?