Lab+8+-+Projectile+Motion

= __Lab 8 - Projectile Motion__  = The y component of the ball's trajectory is parabolic, concave down.

[IMAGE NOT FOUND. IMAGINATION REQUIRED TO VIEW POSITION GRAPHS.] For the x component of the ball's trajectory, the reference points are equally spaced apart because there is no acceleration in the x direction to cause it to have any velocity other than a constant one, assuming no air resistance of course. For the y component of the ball's trajectory, the reference points are not equally spaced apart due to change in velocity caused by acceleration due to gravity. The position of the ball mainly tracks from the horizontal origin up to the ball's peak, then downward.

The velocity of the x direction remains at a relatively constant velocity as indicated by the mostly linear correlation between the velocity and time. Also, since the slope (or change) in the x velocity is very close to zero, we can conclude that had there been no imperfections due to inaccurate tracking of the ball's trajectory, the correlation would be exactly flat, indicating a constant velocity. The velocity of the y direction obviously is negative. The change in the velocity over time is around -10.21 m/s/s which is very close to gravity's expected acceleration of 9.8 m/s/s. Again, due to inaccurate and inconsistent information gathering, we can conclude that had data acquisition been exact, the velocity for the y direction would be exactly -9.8 m/s/s. Interestingly enough, as if by magic, the acceleration only affects the y component of the object's trajectory and not the x component.

Points (2.7,1.9) and (2.7,2.7): 0^2 + 0.8^2 = c^2 | 0 + 0.64 = c^2 | √0.64 = c | 0.8 ≈ c Points (2.7,-0.3) and (2.7,-2): 0^2 + 1.7^2 = c^2 | 0 + 2.89 = c^2 | √2.89 = c | 1.7 ≈ c I am quite sure that you would not need to use Pythagorean Theorem in order to calculate the velocity of the ball using the velocity values as state in the directions. If I am correct, you would pythagorize the points on the position curve to find the slope of the line that lays tangent to the curve at those points. If the slope of a point is given on a position graph, that is the velocity.