HORIZONTAL

PROJECTILE
MOTION
Physics
 Projectiles: objects thrown or launched into the air
and subjected to gravity.
 The path of a projectile is a parabola
 A projectile may start at a given height and move
horizontally toward the ground.
 Examples:a ball rolling off a table, an object being
thrown horizontally from a height, or a bullet being
fired.
 A projectile may be fired at an angle.
 Examples: catapults, cannonballs, throwing a football,
shooting a basketball
 A projectile is like an object in free-fall,
except it now has a horizontal velocity.
 A projectile has horizontal and vertical
velocities
 At the start of its path, the projectile is
moving horizontally. This means there is no
vertical motion (yet).
 Ifthere is no vertical motion, there is no vertical
velocity.
 So, at the beginning, ALL of a horizontal
projectile’s motion is in the horizontal
direction.
 Since we don’t care about air resistance, the
horizontal velocity will not change.
 There
is nothing acting on the object
HORIZONTALLY to make it change its velocity.
 The horizontal velocity is CONSTANT.
 Vx= constant
 The second the object leaves where it’s
being fired from, it begins to fall downward.
 Once it has vertical motion, it must have a
vertical velocity.
 As the object continues to fall, its VERTICAL
velocity will increase (accelerated by gravity), and
its HORIZONTAL speed will stay the same.
 We can draw this concept using vectors!
 Gravity acts the same way on horizontal
projectiles as it does on free-falling objects,
but it only affects the VERTICAL part of the
projectile’s velocity.
 The HORIZONTAL part will not be affected at
all!
LAUNCH ANGLE

Which angle gives the farthest distance? (Test question)

HORIZONTAL MOTION
 If we know the horizontal velocity of a
projectile, we can find out how far away it
will land.
 Horizontal velocity of a projectile:
Δx = vxt
 Example:
A ball rolls off a table with a horizontal
velocity of 15m/s. If it is in the air for 0.4
seconds, how far away from the edge of the
table will the ball land?

Δx = vxt
VERTICAL MOTION/TIME
 If we know the time the ball is in the air, we
can figure out the height the projectile was
thrown from.
h =- t2, where g = -9.8m/s2

 Example: Find the height of the table from

the previous example.
PROJECTILE EQUATIONS
 Horizontal Distance,
 Horizontal velocity,
 Height,
 Vertical velocity,
 We can also determine the time an object is
in the air, IF we know the height it fell from.
 We can use the same equation
 Example: A glass of water is knocked off a
dinner table 0.8 m tall. How long was the
glass of water in the air before it crashed to
the ground?
EXAMPLE 1
 Tom chases Jerry
across a 1.0 m high
table. Jerry steps out
of the way, and Tom
slides off the table.
He flies through the
air for 0.5 seconds
and hits the floor
2.2m away from the
table. What was
Tom’s speed when he
slid off the table?
EXAMPLE 2
 A ball is thrown horizontally at a speed of
30m/s from the top of a building. If the ball
hits the ground 4 seconds later, how high is
the building? How far out from the edge of
the building does the ball land?
EXAMPLE 3
 Wile E. Coyote
(Super Genius)
runs off the side of
a cliff. If the cliff
is 100m high, and
his velocity is
5m/s, how far
away from the
edge of the cliff
does he land?