Solving Friction Problems: Boy vs Girl Tug-of-War

  • Thread starter Thread starter SkiingAlta
  • Start date Start date
  • Tags Tags
    Friction
Join the discussion
Ask a follow-up here, or get your own question answered by working scientists, mathematicians and engineers — people, not an autocomplete.
Real named experts · corrections over time · the nuance an AI answer skips
2 replies · 2K views
SkiingAlta
Messages
19
Reaction score
0
Hi,
I am a bit confused with all this friction stuff... How would I begin to solve this problem and by using what formulas? Thanks.

Suppose a 65-kg boy and a 45-kg girl use a massless rope in a tug-of-war on an icy, resistance-free surface. If the accelleration of the girl toward the boy is 3.0 m/s2, find the magnitude of the acceleration of the boy toward the girl.
 
on Phys.org
This is happening on a resistance free surface. There is no friction.

Also, you at least need to attempt the problem on your own. Your hint though is to think about force balancing, and that you only need one formula.
 
In this problem there is no friction. You can solve this problem by using Newton's third law.
From the given data, find the force acting on the girl by boy. The girl must react with same force on boy.