Essays on Elastic Collision

Objective

The purpose of this experiment was to examine the impact of two hockey pucks in an inelastic collision and to confirm that momentum and energy are almost entirely conserved, allowing for the inherent errors involved in the observation process. The law of conservation of energy states that during a collision, energy can neither be gained nor lost, but can be transferred or transformed. During an elastic collision, the energy and momentum is transferred from one object to another. Unlike in an inelastic collision (such as the kind seen in the previous laboratory experiment), we expect kinetic energy in an elastic ...

Introduction

The purpose of this experiment was to observe collisions between two carts, measure energy changes and classify the collisions. It was hypothesized the momentum would be conserved during the collisions.

- Consider a head on collision between two billiard balls. One is initially at rest and the other moves towards it. Sketch a position vs. time graph for each ball, starting with the time before the collision and ending a shot time afterward Before collision, ball 2 moves with a constant velocity towards ball 1. Therefore, its position changes with time while the position of ball 1 does not change. After elastic ...

A collision refers to a physical situation where kinetic energy of momentum of an object is transferred from an object to the other one. In physics, collisions are classified as either elastic or inelastic. Conservation laws; energy conservation and momentum conservation are important tools in the analysis of collisions. Various literatures and experimental studies have confirmed that it is difficult to assess the interaction of bodies during collision. Therefore, main objective of this work is to demonstrate to relate the various parameters such as velocities and masses of the system using the principle of conservation of energy and momentum.

The momentum of an object of mass, m and velocity, v is represented mathematically as shown below:

momentum, ...

Introduction and Theory

The main aim of this experiment is to investigate energy and momentum conservation in a closed system. Momentum and energy conservation principles are significant physical variables that engineers use when describing various physical phenomenon. Momentum of a body is a vector quantity, which is given by the product of its velocity and mass. In collision theory, the momentum of the body is always conserved when two bodies collide. The principle of momentum conservation applies to both elastic and inelastic conservation irrespective of the dynamic interaction between the two objects. This report demonstrates the application of momentum equation in determination of motion parameters ( ...

Introduction

In any collision, where the system is not subject to external forces, linear momentum will be conserved. In case the collision is elastic, kinetic energy will also be conserved. In this experiment, two steel balls were made to collide momentarily, and the projection of their 2D collision dynamics was recorded for analysis. The vectors measured using the carbon paper, are related to the momenta of the balls before and after collision. These were used in the respective equations to verify linear momentum conservation and elastic collision, i.e. kinetic energy conservation.

Data Analysis

Sample Calculations xi = 67 cm; xt’ = 61.5 cm; ...