Question

how do you calculate the speed of the center of mass of three objects moving away from one another

Answer 1

vectors !

Answer 2

\[Vcm = (m1*v1 + m2*v2+....) / (m1+m2+...)\]

all the v are vectors here

Answer 3

so its basicaly the resultant of the three?

Answer 4

first - intuition - vcm is in the same direction as before

now in order to calculate vcm
let our y axis to point vertically downward and x axis horizontally to the right

vcm-ydirection = (1*10*cos(60) + 1*10*cos(60)) / 2 = 5

vcm-xdirection = (1*10*sin(60) - 1*10*sin(60)) / 2 = 0