What's my mistake in this problem in dynamics involving pulleys?

  • #31
Adesh said:
Accelerations of block A and block B.
So what equation do you get by carrying out the differentiation in post #16?
 
on Phys.org
  • #32
Adesh said:
...
Please explain me as I have no reason to believe that block A and B will have same acceleration.
Another way to look at this problem:
A moveable pulley can be considered as a second class lever with mechanical advantage of 2.

Moveable-pulley-as-second-class-lever.svg
 
  • Like
Likes   Reactions: Adesh
  • #33
haruspex said:
So what equation do you get by carrying out the differentiation in post #16?
Acceleration of the blocks.
 
  • Like
Likes   Reactions: Lnewqban
  • #34
haruspex said:
So what equation do you get by carrying out the differentiation in post #16?
But there is something that is troubling me, ##(-l_1, 0)## is the current position of the block A and ##(0, -l_2)## is the current position of block B, but acceleration is not the second derivative of fixed positions (because in that case it will always come out to be zero). We should say, that at ##t=0## the positions of the blocks were so and so.
 
  • #35
Adesh said:
But there is something that is troubling me, ##(-l_1, 0)## is the current position of the block A and ##(0, -l_2)## is the current position of block B, but acceleration is not the second derivative of fixed positions (because in that case it will always come out to be zero). We should say, that at ##t=0## the positions of the blocks were so and so.
You did not define l1 etc. as merely initial positions. Why should they not mean positions at time t, i.e. define l1 = l1(t) etc.
Also, you don't need to use vector representations. Just define each displacement in the direction that suits it.
 
  • Like
  • Informative
Likes   Reactions: Adesh and Delta2
  • #36
haruspex said:
You did not define l1 etc. as merely initial positions. Why should they not mean positions at time t, i.e. define l1 = l1(t) etc.
Also, you don't need to use vector representations. Just define each displacement in the direction that suits it.
Yes, this advice and way of solving it is helping me very much. Now, I’m able to solve almost all problems of pulleys and strings, credit goes to you.

I think these pulleys and strings problems are archetypical, textbooks on Newtonian Mechanics (like French’s Mechanics, Univeristy Physics) don’t actaully teach it exclusively.

Now, I’m into elevator problems :confused:.
 
  • Like
Likes   Reactions: Lnewqban

Similar threads

  • · Replies 2 ·
Replies
2
Views
1K
  • · Replies 2 ·
Replies
2
Views
2K
  • · Replies 5 ·
Replies
5
Views
2K
  • · Replies 37 ·
2
Replies
37
Views
4K
  • · Replies 33 ·
2
Replies
33
Views
2K
Replies
3
Views
2K
  • · Replies 28 ·
Replies
28
Views
4K
Replies
13
Views
4K
  • · Replies 15 ·
Replies
15
Views
7K