My hrk chapter 7 notes

Ironmad90

June 29, 2020

Abstract
These are my notes for hrk chapter 7. These notes are about some skipped
steps in derivations. You can use these for yourself too. Sorry if I made mistakes
in English, I am not native. I made this using the sample latex file in Evan
Chen’s website (evanchen.cc/olympiad)

Contents
1 Sample problem 7.6 2

2 Proof of equation 7.23 2

3 Sample problem 7.7 2

1
My hrk chapter 7 notes 2

1 Sample problem 7.6

The question is why doesn’t friction force affect the position of the center of mass?
The answer is simple: Because it is an internal force for the ball+shell system. There
is friction between shell and ball and friction force acts both on ball and shell. They
make an action-reaction pair which means they are internal forces and therefore
they don’t affect position of center of mass since

X −−→ P −−→
−−
→ −−
→ Fext
Fext = M acm =⇒ acm = .
M
Note that only horizontal
P position of center of mass doesn’t change. Vertical
position changes since Fexty 6= 0.
Also note that having acmy = 0 or acmx = 0 doesn’t mean vertical or horizontal
position of center of mass isn’t changing. It may also move with constant velocity.
But in this problem center of mass didn’t have initial horizontal velocity so the
horizontal velocity will remain zero meaning horizontal position of center of mass
won’t change.

2 Proof of equation 7.23

P −−→
I think the proof given in the book just shows that this equation reduces to Fext =
M− a−
→
cm for constant mass. Here is my proof for it:

→
−
dP d(→
−
p1 + →
−
p2 + · · · + −
p→
N) d→
−
p1 d→ −
p2 d−
p→
N
X− → X− → X −→
= = + +· · ·+ = F1 + F2 +· · ·+ FN
dt dt dt dt dt
X −−→ X −−→ X −−→
= Fint + Fext = Fext
We cancelled internal forces because they are action-reaction pairs and they add up
P→ − −
→
to zero. Note we used F = ddtp for a single particle which is true for non-constant
P→− P −−→ d− →
mass but F = m→ −
a isn’t true for non-constant mass. So Fext = dtP is true for
P −−→
non-constant mass but Fext = M −a−
→
cm isn’t.
You can see that this proof is really similar to proof of conservation of linear
momentum. And yes you are right! In fact you just take the colliding bodies as
your system and if sum of external forces is zero then you get the familiar law of
conservation of momentum.

3 Sample problem 7.7

What happens if there are still some bullets not fired inside the gun right before
the first one we fired hits the block? Let’s analyze! Say we have a0 bullets to start
with. Let’s say that right before the first bullet we fired hits the block we have a1
My hrk chapter 7 notes 3

bullets left in the gun. First let’s write conservation of momentum for the block and
a0 − a1 bullets in the air. We have:

(a0 − a1 )mv = (M + m(a0 − a1 ))V1

Now we have the initial problem but with a1 bullets instead of a0 . Let’s say there
are a2 bullets left in the gun right before the first bullet (in our new set of bullets)
hits the block. Let’s write conservation of momentum for the block and bullets (We
must be careful here. a0 − a1 bullets are already in the block and there are a1 − a2
bullets in the air. Also block + a0 − a1 bullets inside it has velocity V1 . After all
a1 − a2 bullets hit the block we will have a total of (a0 − a1 ) + (a1 − a2 ) = a0 − a2
bullets in the block):

(M + m(a0 − a1 ))V1 + (a1 − a2 )mv = (M + m(a0 − a2 ))V2

Let’s do the same process in general case. We have the initial problem but with an
bullets instead of a0 . Let’s write conservation of momentum((a0 − a1 ) + (a1 − a2 ) +
· · · + (an−1 − an = a0 − an are already in the block and there are an − an+1 bullets
in the air. Also block + a0 − an bullets inside it has velocity Vn . After all an − an+1
bullets hit the block we will have a total of (a0 − an ) + (an − an+1 ) = a0 − an+1
bullets in the block):

(an − an+1 )mv + (M + m(a0 − an ))Vn = (M + m(a0 − an+1 ))Vn+1

Now let’s come back to our problem and use the givens. But wait! We don’t know
how many bullets will be left in the gun. We will just assume 7 and calculate LOL.
This means we will fire bullets one by one. After the first one hits the block we will
fire the second bullet and so on. So a0 = 8, a1 = 7, a2 = 6, . . . , a8 = 0.

(a0 − a1 )mv
V1 =
M + m(a0 − a1 )
(a0 −a1 )mv
((
(M
(+ m(a0 − a1 )) M (
(( (
(M + m(a0 − a1 ))V1 + (a1 − a2 )mv ( (( +m(a
(( ((
0 −a1 )
V2 = = (
M + m(a0 − a2 ) M + m(a0 − a2 )
(a1 − a2 )mv mv(a0 − a2 )
+ =
M + m(a0 − a2 ) M + m(a0 − a2 )
(a0 −a2 )mv
((
(M
(+ m(a0 − a2 )) M (
(( (
(M + m(a0 − a2 ))V2 + (a2 − a3 )mv ( (( +m(a
(( ((
0 −a2 )
V3 = = (
M + m(a0 − a3 ) M + m(a0 − a3 )
(a2 − a3 )mv mv(a0 − a3 )
+ =
M + m(a0 − a3 ) M + m(a0 − a3 )
..
.
My hrk chapter 7 notes 4

mv(a0 − 
a
1 +1 −
a 2 + ··· +
a  − an )
an−1
 mv(a0 − an )
Vn = =
M + m(a0 − an ) M + m(a0 − an )

Plugging in the values we have:

m
V8 = 2.8
s
You may ask that why is the answer V8 and not V7 or V9 . Because from the general
analysis we did we got that speed Vn+1 is acquired when the block absorbs a0 − an+1
bullets. So we will have speed V8 when the block absorbs a0 − a7+1 = 8 − 0 bullets
which is exactly what we wanted.
If we also include the gun in our system we should account for the horizontal
force that keeps the gun fixed. We are not given any info about this force so this
would be a bad (or even unusable with the data given in the problem) approach.