Free Fall
![](//3.bp.blogspot.com/-KSaaQygZp_w/UEih4714OkI/AAAAAAAAAAc/yS4kSGqQabI/s1600/q.gif)
To
a physicist, the term "free fall" has a different meaning than it
does to a skydiver. In physics, free fall is the (one-dimensional)
motion of any object under the influence of gravity only - no air
resistance or friction effects of any kind, whereas it is air
resistance that makes skydiving a hobby rather than a suicide
attempt!
You might think that since just about everything we observe
falling is falling through the air, that "physics free fall" must be
a pretty useless idea in practice. Not so! Any falling object's
motion is at least approximately free fall as long as:
- it is relatively heavy compared to its size. (Dropping a
ball, as in the picture at right, or jumping off a chair, is a
free-fall motion, but dropping an unfolded piece of paper, or the
motion of a dust particle floating in the air, is not. If you
crumble the paper into a "paper wad", however, its motion is
approximately free fall.
- it falls for a relatively short time. (If you jump off a
chair, you are in free fall. After you have jumped out of an
airplane and fallen for several seconds, you are not in free fall,
since air resistance is now a factor in your motion.)
- it is moving relatively slowly. (If you drop a ball or
throw it down its motion will be free fall. If you shoot it out of
a cannon, its motion won't be free fall.)
You should also note that an object doesn't have to be falling to
be in free fall - if you throw a ball upward its motion is still
considered to be free fall, since it is moving under the influence of
gravity
http://www.batesville.k12.in.us/physics/phynet/mechanics/kinematics/FreeFallIntro.html
Free fall acceleration:
If you throw something vertically upward and could somehow eliminate
or ignore the effect of drag and air on the object , Then the object
accelerates constantly when it goes up and falls down , This is called
free fall.
If something falls freely under the effect of earth’s gravity without
any effect of air then the phenomenon is called free fall.
While the free fall , no matter how big , small or weighty the object
is , every object feel the same constant acceleration , the constant acceleration
during free fall is called free fall acceleration.
The free fall acceleration of earth is denoted by “g” and it’s value
at the surface of earth is approximately
9.8m/s , But you should also
note that the value of “
g” varies slightly with change in latitude and
elevation from surface of earth
Suppose the motion in vertically upward direction as positive motion
and the motion in downward direction as negative motion.
we can replace the “acceleration = a” in constant acceleration
equations by “free fall acceleration = -g” and as the direction of the
motion of object in free fall is vertically downward or upward so we can
replace the “x 0″ with “y 0″ and “x” with “y” and get our final free
fall acceleration equations as:
Equation 1:
![v = v_0 - gt v = v_0 - gt](https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/blogger_img_proxy/AEn0k_sUZcgr8Cwg63LVOuC_CeGCVqYe2I4DqSZT3tA3x9UaWkxSbcNhCy3f-m0wRYNcbTeoz8SP2cmNTYtcvPBfCK3LeF-D2GXoy2LTr2M6r61v6bPxNqaY4ZLP90TJRjeZzaAZcfhyYWkg-x5YilyCYr3n=s0-d)
Equation 2:
![y - y_0 = v_0.t -
\frac{1}{2} g t^2 y - y_0 = v_0.t - \frac{1}{2} g t^2](https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/blogger_img_proxy/AEn0k_ugbZhZiO8Ox6P1b8hMUqokin1MxO8rOba6uf2fUYXgCiflYaELeE-SOYMByE43PSfYrhCYr5cKwkZbaG4kMeH9wHb4tDZUtOURmjK0X8jv8gfMJyqdC5bEMyXjMbVs7ygVTl6awzm1Tp69EOAhwZU50XQqUwWxjIerjO1NVA-q8ptHz3pBaS2WaIytx-iZaGsFwbqg=s0-d)
Equation 3:
![v^2 = v_0 ^2 - 2 g(y - y_0) v^2 = v_0 ^2 - 2 g(y - y_0)](https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/blogger_img_proxy/AEn0k_uzVvUeVeKUyd36EinK7g1kEGP79mSBCFDY6T2HVNwGE2nX3YHiVg9x5GpboI8de_sciyTj8BsnU_tak-ZFlidvVTiCkU1tgpWfYSACa6qeMx_MTbXpGbB3teR-4vhXYWXW31tjKFxwvtpARKrNGhqkk34a2pfnm-GiojU6bcmRjg748w=s0-d)
Equation 4:
![y - y_0 = \frac{1}{2}
(v_0 + v) t y - y_0 = \frac{1}{2} (v_0 + v) t](https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/blogger_img_proxy/AEn0k_soq1wbqpRP0yyqMPpryYMEDKMk88HOF2_McmR0M4itmY2gY6DjcNyj3Oix8j-o_9rIadmr-H1xDvbjFQxhDgOQQa7Cu6yDgR0vcKFPu3cY4PMqcUI1pFC1zm0ASC9vt_j-6yQrlOvcBzQBuTsyDALDFowp-LDMxQCRfKeaXUW-t63HXCKMD08L8_3lM8hBb004jA=s0-d)
Equation 5:
http://oscience.info/physics/free-fall-acceleration/
Free-fall under gravity
Galileo Galilei was the first scientist to appreciate that, neglecting
the
effect of air resistance, all bodies in free-fall close to the
Earth's
surface accelerate vertically downwards with the same acceleration:
namely,
.1The
neglect of air resistance is a fairly good approximation for large
objects
which travel relatively slowly (e.g., a shot-putt, or a
basketball), but
becomes a poor approximation for small objects which travel relatively
rapidly
(e.g., a golf-ball, or a bullet fired from a pistol).
Equations
can easily be modified to deal with the
special case of an object free-falling under gravity:
Here,
is the downward acceleration due to gravity,
is the
distance the object has moved vertically between times
and
(if
then
the object has
risen
meters, else
if
then
the object has
fallen
meters), and
is the
object's instantaneous velocity at
. Finally,
is the
object's instantaneous velocity at time
.
Suppose that
a ball is released from rest and allowed to fall under the influence of
gravity.
How long does it take the ball to fall
meters? According to the equation,
[with
(since
the ball is released from rest), and
(since we
wish the
ball to fall
meters)],
, so
the time of fall is
Suppose that a ball is
thrown vertically upwards from ground level with velocity
.
To what height does the ball rise,
how
long does it remain in the air, and with what velocity does it strike
the
ground? The ball attains its maximum height when it is momentarily at
rest
(i.e., when
).
According to the equation
(with
),
this occurs at time
. It
follows from equation
(with
, and
) that
the maximum height of the ball
is given by
When the ball strikes the ground it has traveled zero net meters
vertically, so
.
It follows from equations (with
and
) that
.
In other words, the ball hits the ground with an equal and opposite
velocity to that
with
which it was thrown into the air. Since the ascent and decent phases of
the ball's
trajectory are clearly symmetric, the ball's time of flight is
simply twice the time required for the ball to attain its maximum
height:
http://farside.ph.utexas.edu/teaching/301/lectures/node19.html
Examples of Free Fall (problems):
1.
John throws the ball straight upward and after 1 second
it reaches its maximum height then it does free fall motion which takes 2
seconds. Calculate the maximum height and velocity of the ball before
it crashes the ground. (g=10m/s²)
2.
Calculate the velocity of the car
which has initial velocity 24m/s and acceleration 3m/s² after 15 second.
We use the first equation to solve
this question.
3.
The boy drops the ball from a
roof of the house which takes 3 seconds to hit the ground. Calculate the
velocity before the ball crashes to the ground. (g=10m/s²)
Velocity is;
V=g.t
V=10m/ s².3s=30m/s
We have learned how to find the
velocity of the object at a given time. Now we will learn how to find
the distance taken during the motion. I give some equations to calculate
distance and other quantities. Galileo found
an equation for distance from his experiments.
This equation is;
Using this equation we can find the
height of the house in given example above. Let’s found how height the
ball has been dropped? We use 10 m/s²
for g.
I think the formula now a little
bit clearer in your mind. We will solve more problems related to this
topic. Now, think that if I throw the ball straight upward with an
initial velocity. When it stops and falls back to the ground? We answer
these questions now.
![free fall girl image free fall girl image](https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/blogger_img_proxy/AEn0k_uijj5S2PpNMnGhLAkU0QZXurpFcXPC68m1mSgJOXv5kgg2T1sh9S_Pmbwi74itBTpP1HnTYHBVZDHfYVzkc8nupwGv1jAbAhXvIRyAxhWlK9Elj-JIfsm7YwRVWwQjQqouhR8FoA=s0-d)
Picture shows the magnitudes of
velocity at the bottom and at the top. As you can see the ball is
thrown upward with an initial v velocity, at the top it’s velocity
becomes zero and it changes it’s direction and starts to fall down which
is free fall. Finally at the bottom before the crash it reaches its
maximum speed which shown as V’. We have talked about the amount of
increase in the velocity in free fall. It increases 9,8m/s in each
second due to the gravitational acceleration. In this case, there is
also g but the ball’s direction is upward; so the sign of g is negative.
Thus, our velocity decreases in 9,8m/s in each second until the
velocity becomes zero. At the top, because of the zero velocity, the
ball changes its direction and starts to free fall. Before solving
problems I want to give the graphs of free fall motion.
![graphs of free fall graphs of free fall](https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/blogger_img_proxy/AEn0k_tvEvXg74rvXZSOJY1Hh_jJ1QC8drrVN7pMFi7Rl_Z1W5wQO3Q6Bba82rE9KFnGV2GN2MEa9dJ9S0BzUu6p1_twPaUfhcdHvts0rWwzWIjejapFRb05vyjUs8fnUJUwPY9YxKAceg=s0-d)
As you see in the graphs our
velocity is linearly increases with an acceleration “g”, second graphs
tells us that acceleration is constant at 9,8m/s², and finally third
graphic is the representation of change in our position. At the
beginning we have a positive displacement and as the time passes it
decreases and finally becomes zero. Now we can solve problems using
these graphs and explanations.
http://www.physicstutorials.org/home/mechanics/1d-kinematics/free-fall
Thank you for visiting!:)