Question

How to find the instantaneous acceleration by looking at this graph (file attached) at time 0.50s?

Answer 1

Hey alphabeta!

Acceleration is the rate of change in velocity or in other words,

\(\sf acceleration = \Large \frac{dv}{dt}\)= Slope of Velocity-time graph.

So, let's suppose we want to calculate the acceleration of the body at t=1 sec, then slope will roughly be equal to 6 over 1 = \(\sf \Large \frac{6}{1}\)

Answer 2

Thanks @Abhisar ! That really helped a lot! :-)

Answer 3

You're welcome c:

Answer 4

At least I thought I understood? For some reason, I don't get the right answer! I'm doing it like this: (4.2ms^-1)/(0.50s) = 8.4 ms^-2, but the markscheme says 4.5ms^-2...

But when thinking about it, isn't this the average acceleration rather than the instantaneous?

Answer 5

@Abhisar

Answer 6

What do you want to figure out, instantaneous acceleration or average acceleration?

Answer 7

Instantaneous (as written in my first post) :-)

Answer 8

Well, in that case it should be 8.4 m/s^2. That's what I believe but let's call @IrishBoy123 to counter check it.

Answer 9

you need the slope of the tangent line at t = 0.5

i think @Abhisar 's line is parallel and gives you a very good approximation

so your denominator should be 1 in your calculation

but it's just an approximation, isn't it :p