Stuck Together Collision

Stuck Together Collision#

A perfectly inelastic collision occurs between an object of mass m initially travelling along the positive x-axis at speed v, and an object of mass 2m initially travelling along the positive y-axis at the same speed v. Following the collision the objects stick together and travel at a final speed vf at an angle θ degrees from the positive x-axis as shown in the figure below.

A before picture, displaying a small mass travelling to the right at velocity v and a larger mass travelling up at velocity v, and an after picture, where the two masses are now stuck together and travelling at some velocity v sub f at an angle theta above the positive x-axis.

Part 1#

The value of the angle θ is:

Answer Section#

  • 26.6 ∘

  • 54.7 ∘

  • 63.4 ∘

  • 71.6 ∘

  • 81.9 ∘

Attribution#

Problem is licensed under the CC-BY-NC-SA 4.0 license.
The Creative Commons 4.0 license requiring attribution-BY, non-commercial-NC, and share-alike-SA license.