# Force and acceleration

1. Sep 16, 2006

### Warrzie

This one has me clueless. The problem reads:

"An object of mass m1 on a frictionless horizontal table is connected to an object of mass m2 through a very light pulley P1 and a light fixed pulley P2."

It wants me to state the relationship between the accelerations, with a1 and a2 corresponding to m1 and m2 respectively.

It then wants the tension in both strings, and finally the acceleration of each block in terms of m1, g, and m2

I've stared at the attached figure for a while and don't even understand how m2's string is connect to the floating pulley, or if that pulley even has an effect on the accelerations/tension. I want to say that a1=a2 since the blocks are attached to each other.

Any hints?

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2. Sep 16, 2006

You may want to put a link to the image instead of an attachment, since these usually don't work.

3. Sep 16, 2006

### Astronuc

Staff Emeritus
The acceleration of m2 = acceleration of pulley P1. On has to determine the accleration of m1 and the acceleration of P1. When P1 moves (translates) $\Delta{x}$, by what distance does m1 translate? One may assume the string tied to m2 is fixed to the axis of P1 and is of fixed length.

Last edited: Sep 16, 2006