Swinging Mass

Swinging Mass#

A mass, \(m\), tied to the end of a string is swung horizontally on a frictionless surface in the counter-clockwise direction, exhibiting uniform circular motion as shown in Fig. 1.

Figure 1. Taking one end of the string as the origin of a Cartesian plane, a mass is atatched to the other end and swung anti-clockwise.

Part 1#

When the string returns to parallel to the \(x\)-axis, it is cut in half by a very sharp knife. The subsequent motion of the mass is:

Answer Section#

  • The mass will pull sharply to the left.

  • The mass will continue in the positive y direction.

  • The mass will stop.

  • The mass will continue around the circle.

  • The mass will be thrown out of the circle with components in the positive x and y directions.

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.