Class 5, Thursday, September 15, 2015

Reading: 4-4

Projectile Motion - Examples

Example 1 The following conceptual question provides three parabolic trajectories,

which have the same maximum height. You are asked to rank them according to: (a) The
time of flight; (b) the y-component of the launch velocity; (c) The x-component of the
launch velocity; (d) The launch speed.

We label the narrowest trajectory (red curve) with 1., the next one as 2, and the widest as
3. We could reason, for example, in the following way (there are, of course other possible
options).
!
Based on v02y = 2gh (the y-component at maximum height is zero!), we conclude that the
y-components of the launch speed are the same for all three cases. Therefore, for (b) we
have, v01 = v02 = v03 .

Intuitively, the time of flight must be the same for all trajectories, because the maximum
height is the same. Formally, this follows from −v0 y = v0 y − gt . So, the answer to (a) is
! !
vyf

also t1 = t2 = t3 .

R3 > R2 > R1 !
(c) " ⇒ v0 x3 > v0 x 2 > v0 x1 .
R = v0 x t #

Another way to reason through this part is geometrically. All y-components of the launch
velocity are the same, but the launch angle decreases from case 1 to 3. The x-component
of the launch velocity is related to the y-component via tan α 0 in the following way:

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(d) Finally, since all y-components of the launch speed are the same, the launch speeds
are in the same order as their x-components.

Example 2 The famous London bus jump in 1975, which took place in the Wembley
stadium, was supposed to be the last of Evel Knievel’s stunts. 13 busses were lined up
side to side, and Evel’s launch speed was 100Mph. The width of one bus is 2.44m and its
height is 2.5m. If Evel just made it past the 13th bus, calculate the following quantities: (a)
His launch angle; (b) The total time he spent flying over the busses; (c) The total height
of his trajectory; (d) Had he been launched at a 45o angle, what would his range and
maximum height have been in that case? We neglect air resistance.

I built this example around the only piece of information provided in the movie clip we
watched: Evel Knievel’s launch speed. By researching the dimensions of the 1975
London busses, I obtained the second piece of information needed to work out a wealth
of interesting aspects, some of which are outlined below. This demonstrates the power of
physics and of quantitative reasoning! As is the case with most projectile problems, there
is more than one way to solve the problem. I tried to work with a minimum of basic
equations. For this reason, I did not use the range formula.

(a) We can get the launch angle from the following two equations:

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#   R
% x = x0 + v0 x t

⇒t= (eq. 1)
% R 0 >0
v0 x
%%    2v0 y
$ vy = v 0 y + gt ⇒t=
g
(eq. 2)
%−v0 y v0 y
%v = v sin α
% 0y 0 0

%&v0 x = v0 cos α 0

R = 13⋅ w = 13⋅ 2.44m = 31.72m

100 ⋅1.6 ⋅10 3 m
v0 = 100Mph = = 44.44m / s
3600s

Setting equations (1) and (2) equal to each other:

R 2v0 y R 2v sin α 0
= ⇔ = 0
v0 x g v0 cos α 0 g
Rg Rg
= 2sin α 0 cos α 0 ⇒ sin ( 2α 0 ) =
v02    v02
sin( 2 α 0 )

2
31.72 m
/ ⋅ 9.8m
/ / s/
sin ( 2α 0 ) = 2
= 0.1574 ⇒ 2α 0 = 9.056 0
( 44.44m/ / s/ )
⇒ α 0 = 4.50

(b) We calculate the time, t:

R 31.72m
t= = = 0.72s
v0 x 44.44m / s ⋅ cos 4.50

(c) To calculate the maximum height, we apply the equation:


 gt12
y = 
y0 + v0 y ⋅ t1 +
 2
where t1 = t / 2 = 0.72s / 2 = 0.36s
h 0 >0

m 2
2 (
9.8 ⋅ 0.36s )
m s
⇒ h = 44.44 ⋅ sin ( 4.5o ) ⋅ 0.36s − = 0.62m
s 2

So, he only got 62cm above the tops of the busses.

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(d) We now assume a launch angle of 450 for which we know that he would have had the
maximum range. Why didn’t he go for it?

$ x = x0 + v0 x tnew
& Rnew  0

v0 ⋅cos α 0
&&
m
% 2 ⋅ 44.44 sin 450
& v = v − gt ⇒ t = 0 2v sin α 0 s
= = 6.4s
& y  0y new new
g 9.8
m
&'−v0 sin α0 v0 sin α0 s2
m
⇒ Rnew = v0 ⋅ cos α 0 ⋅ tnew = 44.44 ⋅ cos 450 ⋅ 6.4s = 201.5m
s

We now find the new maximum height:

2
gtn0
hmax = y0 + v0 y tn0 − where tn0 = 6.4 / 2 = 3.2s
  2
0 0
v0 sin 45
2
hmax = 44.44m / s ⋅ sin 450 ⋅ 3.2s − 4.9m / s 2 ⋅ (3.2s ) = 50.4m

Maybe this was too much of a risk to take!

Example 3 Demonstration: Hit the Target (which is, let’s say, an orange). A situation
similar to the lecture demonstration is illustrated in the figure below. An orange hangs up
at a height of y0T = 2m , a distance xT = 5m away from a “launcher”. A projectile is
launched from it, with an initial height of 1m, and at the same time the orange is dropped.
At what angle must the launcher be pointed in order to hit the orange? We tried 3 launch
speeds in lecture.

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The constraint is that final x- and y-coordinates of the projectile be the same as those of
the target and that the flight time is the same for both objects.
We express the time of flight from the condition that the final x-coordinate of the
projectile be xFP = x0T .

xP
vxP = xP t ⇒ t = .
vxP

During this same time, the projectile and the target undergo their vertical motion:

gt 2
yP = y0 P + v0 y t −
2 .
gt 2
yT = y0T −
2

If the projectile is to hit the target, these two y-coordinates must be the same.

gt 2 gt 2
yP = yT ⇒ y0 P + v0 y t − = y0T −
2 2
⇒ y0T − y0 P = v0 y t

Into this, we can now substitute the time obtained above,

xP
y0T − y0 P = v0 y = tan α 0 ⋅ xP
! vxP
v0 sin α 0 !
v0 cos α 0

y0T − y0 P
⇒ tan α 0 =
xP

In conclusion, the projectile will only hit the target, if it was aimed at the target. For the
numbers given, we can calculate this launch angle.

" 2m −1m % 0
α 0 = tan −1 $ ' = 11.3 .
# 5m &

We can also calculate the minimum launched speed required to hit the target, i.e. if the
projectile were to hit it just as it touches the ground.

For the target:

! ! ! gt 2 4m
y! = y + v t − ⇒t= = 0.64s .
FT !0T !0T
2 g
0 2m 0

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For the projectile:
2
! ! ! gt 2 4.9m / s 2 ⋅ ( 0.64s ) −1m
yFP = y0 P + v0 P t − ⇒ v0 = = 8.03s .
! ! ! 2 sin11.3 0
⋅ 0.64s
0 1m v sin α
0 0

The figure below shows a set of four trajectories, which differ only in the launch speed.

We can now take this decoupled motion of the two objects to a different level, by
requiring that the projectile be launched from a moving platform. We will first do this as
the platform is moving horizontally at constant speed.

Example 4. Howitzer and Ball on a Horizontal Air Track Demonstration. A ball is

launched vertically from a cart, which moves at constant speed on a horizontal,
frictionless track. The question is, whether the ball will land back in the cart.

What does an observer riding with the cart see?

This person would see the ball moving vertically upward and then falling back into the
cart on a linear vertical trajectory. This is not very exciting. What does the motion look
like from the perspective of an observer standing on the ground?

From this perspective, because the ball was launched from the moving cart, it has both an
!
upward initial velocity, vB , its launch velocity, as well as a horizontal velocity, vC , that
of the cart. Hence, its launch speed is,

v0 = vB2 + vC2
vB
Its launch angle is given by, tan α 0 = .
vC

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Owing to the fact that there is no acceleration in the horizontal direction, the ball is
moving to the right at the same constant speed as the cart, which means that it will fall
back into it.

Example 4 Howitzer and Ball on Inclined Air Track. Will the ball still fall into the
cart, if the track is inclined? In lecture we tried out different inclinations, and, no matter
how steep the track was, the ball always fell into the cart, provided, of course, it was
launched perpendicularly to the surface. Why does it work?

The short answer: This problem is best understood from the point of view of an observer
standing on the incline. From this perspective, the projectile experiences along the incline
the same acceleration as the cart, gsin θ . Therefore, even though the cart is accelerating,
it still works that the ball falls back into the cart, provided, of course, that the projectile is
launched perpendicularly to the plane of the incline.