P5 Forces Flashcards
What is force?
Vector quantity (have a magnitude and a direction)
Examples of physical quantities that are vector quantities
-Force, velocity, displacement, acceleration, momentum
Examples of physical quantities that only have magnitude and no direction
Scalar quantities: Speed, distance, mass, temperature, time
What usually represents a vector?
- An arrow
- The length shows the magnitude
- The direction shows the direction of the quantity
Contact force
Forces that make contact (e.g. pushing something)
Non contact force
Forces that don’t make contact (magnetic force, gravitational force)
What is gravitational force?
The force of attraction between masses
Mass
The amount of ‘stuff’ in an object
Weight
The force acting on an object due to gravity
What affects weight?
The strength of the gravitational field at the location of the object
Centre of mass
A point at which you assume the whole mass is concentrated
How is weight measured?
A calibrated spring balance
Are mass and weight directly proportional?
Yes
Weight (N) = ?
Mass (kg) * GFS (N/kg)
What is resultant force?
The overall force on a point or object
What are parallel forces?
The forces are all along the same line (you can add and subtract the forces to find the resultant force)
What is work done in terms of distance and force?
When a force moves an object through a distance, energy is transferred and work is done on the obejct
Work done eq (force and distance)
Force * Distance
What happens when the resultant force is 0?
The object is equilibrium (the 3 forces will make a triangle)
Why should we split forces into simpler components?
Because some forces are at difficult angles to work with
Distance
How far an object has moved (scalar quantity)
Displacement
A vector quantity which measures the distance in a straight line from an object’s starting point to finishing point
Speed
How fast you are going
Velocity
The speed in a given direction
distance travelled eq (speed and time)
Distance = speed / time
Walking speed
1.5 m/s