Two forces with magnitudes of 200 and 100 pounds act on an object at angles of 60° and 170° respectively. Find the direction and magnitude of the resultant force. Round to two decimal places in all intermediate steps and in your final answer.

Question

whpalmer4 · Answer

You can decompose to x and y components by $$x = r \cos \theta$$$$y = r \sin\theta$$

anonymous · Answer

Where r is what? the 200/100 and theta is 60 and 170?

whpalmer4 · Answer

R is magnitude of vector, so 200 or 100 (you do this procedure twice)

whpalmer4 · Answer

Theta is the angle of course

anonymous · Answer

ok, so x=200cos60 and y=100cos170 and what would this be finding? the terminal point of the vector?

whpalmer4 · Answer

Then sum x components to get x component of new vector, and sum y components to get y component of new vector

anonymous · Answer

you can easily see that the angle between the forces is 170-60 =110 degrees. 

You have the magnitude of the two forces and the angle between them.. now use this formula to get the resultant, 

|dw:1372962726835:dw|

and for direction, find the angle the Resultant R makes with the first force using,
 
|dw:1372962805711:dw|

Then you can say that the resultant makes an angle