Question

Can someone please take a little time out of their day to help me complete & answer this question? I do not want a direct answer; I want to understand the question. Any help is greatly appreciated - thank you in advance.

Question: A sailor pushes a 100.0 kg crate up a ramp that is 3.00 m high and 5.00 m long onto the deck of a ship. He exerts a 650.0 N force parallel to the ramp. What is the mechanical advantage of the ramp? What is the efficiency of the ramp? Your response should include all of your work and a free-body diagram.

Answer 1

Do you know the definition of mechanical advantage for your incline plane?

Answer 2

No, @Pompeii00. I don't.

Answer 3

Okay, so mechanical advantage is the way we can express how advantageous it is to use the incline plane. Rather than lifting a box, we can slide the box up an incline plane. Gravity acts completely vertically. By using an incline plane, now we only have to fight the component of gravity parallel to the plane rather than all of gravity.

So mechanical advantage is defined as a ratio, which relates what we would need to do to push the box up the plane and what we would need to do to lift the box against the entire force of gravity.