Ok so I completely forgot to add up my forces for Newton's second law, thank you. I guess now I realize the importance of a force body diagram.
I derived:
(T+F/m) = a
(T/M) = a
Resulting in : -FM/(M+m)
I guess g is irrelevant in this question, the boat would be traveling the same direction as the tugboat as it is being pulled so I would only need to consider the horiztonal forces acting on the objects?
Homework Statement
A tugboat of mass m pulls a ship of mass M, accelerating it. Assume that water friction on the two vessels' is negligible.
If the force acting on the tug's propellar is F, what is the tension, T, in the cable connecting the two ships
(Variables: F, M, m)...