Projectile Motion: Understanding Launch Angles and Speeds

[Auto Engineer]

Hi everyone, this is my first post on this forum, if in wrong place please fogive.

I am currently studying physics looking at the topic of projectiles, working out the maths is not a problem, but in class is not like having real experience out in the world around us, so my question is;

What type of books would I look for to help strengthen my understanding of conclusions to be drawn from any results of experiments completed, if say I had launch three projectiles at the same speed but at different angles, and then at the same angles but at different speeds, I would reach different conclusions based on those launch angles and speeds used.

So instead of just saying things like the optimum launch angle is 45 degrees, and higher or lower limits will either increase or reduce the distance travelled, I would have appreciated some information from research completed, would anyone know where to look for that sort of information.

Many thanks

 

[russ_watters]

Welcome to PF.

If you are looking for actual research, the 45 degree angle thing is wrong and the question is one of aerodynamics and gets pretty complicated -- but there wouldn't be any recent research on it, as it is pretty well understood (the only research is on the drag and lift properties of specific projectiles, not on the underlying physics). If you are interested in the 45 degree angel thing, then the question is a basic introductory physics problem of projectile motion in a vacuum and any high school physics book will have a good treatment of the concept.

 

[Lancelot59]

Yeah, projectiles are a pretty simple thing to deal with. Basic kinematics and trig can solve any simple two-dimensional problem. I don't know how to work with 3D vectors yet :/

Basic things like:

A ball is kicked off a building at an angle of (this) and has an initial velocity of (that). What is it's velocity on impact and how long does it take to fall?