Fwd: More on acceleration

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Subject: More on acceleration
Date: Tue, 13 Jun 2006 13:54:52 -0400

Jerry

Tom...

I understand very well. My choice of the words, "accelerated acceleration" was designed to emphasize the concept of increasing acceleration as what I have found to be a good teaching tool. I know full well that it is NOT in the lexicon of an engineer.

If I drop a lead ball from the 28th floor of a building, it will fall at an accelerated rate of 16' per second / per second. That is a fixed RATE of acceleration. (written in stone).

Now, if I attatch a rocket to that ball and aim it down toward the ground, this ball accelerates at an increasing rate. THAT IS ACCELERATED ACCELERATION as I see it. To use different words to avoid offending engineers, we can also say that this is increasing acceleration.

Velocity has to be considered as speed in a given direction....unless we get into the celestial physics of an ever expanding universe in which instance it is velocity in an infinite number of directions.

Velocity, as I see it, is not necessarily in a straight line or linear direction, but can be in a curved or irregular direction.

Tom, you said "Acceleration of the rod tip is a constantly increasing change of speed in a given direction on a straight line plane. Would this work?"...... OK with me.....except that we'd have a collision if our rod tip moved strictly in a straight plane. To avoid that, our best casters move the rod tip in a very slightly convex path.

This stuff makes us all THINK..........THANKS !

Gordy

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Gordy,

I looked for a definition of acceleration and found this:

Acceleration is one of those words for which we have a common meaning and a meaning that is specific to the field of physics. Ask the average person on the street and they will define acceleration as "speeding up." However, this is just a portion of the full meaning of acceleration as used in physics. In physics, acceleration is defined as a change in velocity. Considering this definition closely, we remember that velocity is defined as speed in a given direction. Therefore changing the velocity of an object means changing its speed (rate of motion), its direction of travel or both variables. An object experiencing a change of speed or direction is said to be accelerating.

So let's say "Acceleration of the rod tip is a constantly increasing change of speed in a given direction on a straight line plane."

Would this work?

Tom Cooper

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