Re: Newton's 3rd law? was Re: inertial forces (definition)

[Joseph Bellina <jbellina@SAINTMARYS.EDU>]

I agree completely with your placement of centripetal acceleration...I
do a lab in which students determine geometrically the angle between the
final velocity vector and the change in velocity vector in the limit of
the initial velocity becoming the final...turns out to be around 90
deg....  I do this as soon as I move past linear kinematics, so it just
becomes an exercise in finding the acceleration from the vector change
in velocity in a more complex situation.
After we finish the work, I introduce the label centripetal, but only
for acceleration.

cheers

On Fri, 22 Oct 1999, Stan
Greenspoon wrote:

> In the same vein, I believe that the textooks should discuss circular motion
> kinematics, (includng, of course, centripetal acceleration) in the earlier
> chapter on two-dimensional motion rather than in the much later "Circular
> Motion-Gravitation " chapter.
>
>
> Stan
>
> Stanley Greenspoon       Tel.:  (604) 986-1911 Ext. 2439
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