Kinematics in Two Dimensions
Summary
- Kinematics problems in two dimensions are essentially synthetic geometry problems. To solve them you should be able to…
- represent a kinematic event with a geometric diagram
- use geometry to determine unknown magnitudes (lengths) and directions (angles)
- use these results to determine kinematic quantities
- Review the kinematic definitions presented earlier in this chapter.
- First the scalar quantities…
- Distance is a scalar measure of the space between two positions measured along the actual path connecting them.
- Speed is the rate of change of distance with time.
- And then the vector quantities…
- Displacement is a vector measure of the space between two positions measured along the shortest path connecting them.
- Velocity is the rate of change of displacement with time.
- Acceleration is the rate of change of velocity with time.