The discussion centers on the momentum changes of a railcar when an object is dropped vertically onto it. The mass of the railcar is denoted as ##M## and the mass of the dropped object as ##m##. When the object impacts the railcar, it exerts a leftward force on the cart due to Newton's third law, resulting in a decrease in the cart's velocity. This scenario exemplifies a perfectly inelastic collision where the dropped object and the railcar move together post-impact, demonstrating the conservation of momentum principle.
PREREQUISITESPhysics students, educators, and anyone interested in understanding momentum dynamics in moving systems, particularly in the context of collisions and rail transport mechanics.
Vertically in the rest frame of the ground or of the rail car?kasheee7zark7 said:
Please show some work.kasheee7zark7 said:
If the rock ends up moving at the same horizontal speed as the cart, then there must have been some interaction that accelerated the rock horizontally. For the final speed of the cart the details of that interaction do not matter.kasheee7zark7 said:
The power of conservation laws is the ability to make certain predictions without having to know much about the details.kasheee7zark7 said:
