Recent content by ss85

Homework Statement Two identical cars approach each other on a straight road. The red car has a velocity of 40MPH to the left and the green car has a velocity of 80MPH to the right. A spring is attached to the front bumper so that a head-on collision will be elastic. If the maximum indentation...

Since the cart is starting out already compressed to 8cm, you would have to consider that initial displacement in your equation. Subtract the final elastic potential energy from the original (x=8cm) elastic potential energy on the right side. Do that and you should get 5.6cm.

Alright, I did all the work for this problem, but do not know the correct answers and therefore cannot check my work with 100% confidence. So if somebody could look it over and let me know if I did everything correctly or not, I'd appreciate it. The answer I calculated for part e seemed kind of...