David Gronlund edited Procedure.tex  over 9 years ago

Commit id: 73dbc3d9da00f8f5468db6c968ce301cf45d5141

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\section{Procedure}  Using two hanging balls of different masses, simulate a collision between two objects in empty space. Hold each ball a distance away from its rest position in way that when released at the same time the two should collide. Mark the rest positions for each ball on the graph paper below them, as well as the position that they are being released from. Then release both balls at the same time, so that they collide near or at their rest positions. After the balls collide, watch each carefully until it appears to have stopped, right before it swings back down towards its rest position. Grab the ball at this instant and mark these positions as well on the graph paper. Using the rest position for each ball as the center of their coordinate systems, drawing Draw  vectors from the starting location to the  rest location  and from the  rest location  to the final location. The time it takes for the ball to travel the length of each arrow is approximately $0.456\units s$. Divide the components of each arrow by $.456\units s$ to get the average velocity of each ball at that moment. Then multiply that by the ball's mass to get its average momentum. location  Forexample, the equation for momentum vector $\vec p$ with a distance vector $\vec r$, a time of $\Delta t$, and a mass of $m$ would be:  \begin{equation}  \vec p = \vec r / \Delta t * m  \end{equation}  Adding the initial momentums of  each ball, i.e. from their starting position to the collision, will result in the initial momentum of the system. This should be approximately equal to the final momentum of the system.   %of $\langle 5, 16\rangle$ ball.