Dhyanesh,
Thank you for your response and great explination.
Just a few questions:
1) How do I set the acceleration when I am not sure what it be?
2) What is distance mesured in?
Cheers
-OBCT
Main Topics
Browse All Topics
Loading Advertisement...
Question
Acceleration Formula
I know very little about maths and physics but I need a formula for a car accelerating.
This is going to be used in a very basic program that I am writing.
These are the variables that will have to be in the forumla.
-Car weight
-Distance
-Time
-Speed
A random number between 14-15 (for example) will be generated by my program, then set as "t".
The car weight will be "w", distance "d" and speed as "s"
The formula should calculate the current speed as it starts from 0, then accelerates at an even pace to drive straight while driving "d" and finishes at the exact time specified by "t".
As I said, I no very very little about this area so I'm not even 100% sure what I'm actually trying to do. Please bare with me.
Cheers
-OBCT
This Question has been solved and asker verified All Experts Exchange premium technology solutions are available to subscription members.
Subscribe now for full access to Experts Exchange and get
Instant Access to this Solution
- Plus...
- 30 Day FREE access, no risk, no obligation
- Collaborate with the world's top tech experts
- Unlimited access to our exclusive solution database
- Never be left without tech help again
Trusted by hundreds of thousands everyday for fast, accurate and reliable tech support.
- "The time we save is the biggest benefit of Experts Exchange to Warner Bros. What could take multiple guys 2 hours or more each to find is accessed in around 15 minutes on Experts Exchange." Mike Kapnisakis, Warner Bros.
- "Our team likes having a resource that is more secure than just using Google and most experts using this service really know their stuff. It's nice to look here first versus using Google." Dayna Sellner, Lockheed Martin
- "Anytime that I've been stumped with a problem, 9 out of 10 times Experts Exchange has either the accepted solution or an open discussion of the potential solution to the problem." Kenny Red, eBay Inc.
See what Experts Exchange can do for you.
Got a question?
We've got the answer.
Experts Exchange has been collecting answers to technology questions since 1996…3 million and counting! If you have a question, chances are we already have your answer.
Need individual assistance?
Our experts are ready to help.
If you can't find the exact answer you're looking for, ask our exclusive community of 50,000 experts. You’ll get a personalized answer from a trusted professional.
Want to learn from the best?
Read articles from industry experts.
Thousands of free tech tips, tricks, how-to’s and tutorials are available in our peer reviewed articles section. See for yourself how smart our experts are, no login required.
Working on a long term project?
Store your work and research.
Save solutions to your questions, answers you’ve discovered through searching plus helpful articles in your personal knowledgebase for easy future access.
Access the answers to your technology questions today.
30-day free trial. Register in 60 seconds.
What Makes Experts Exchange Unique?
Members of the expert community talk about why the experience at Experts Exchange is different than what you will find anywhere else.
Trusted by the world's most respected brands.
Faithfully serving IT professionals since 1996.
Try it out and discover for yourself.
30-day free trial. Register in 60 seconds.
Free Tech Articles
-
WARNING: 5 Reasons why you should NEVER fix a computer for free.
It is in our nature to love the puzzle. We are obsessed. The lot of us. We love puzzles. We love the challenge. We thrive on finding the answer. We hate disarray. It bothers us deep in our soul. W...
-
SCCM OSD Basic troubleshooting
SCCM 2007 OSD is a fantastic way to deploy operating systems, however, like most things SCCM issues can sometimes be difficult to resolve due to the sheer volume of logs to sift through and the dispe...
-
Migrate Small Business Server 2003 to Exchange 2010 and Windows 2008 R2
This guide is intended to provide step by step instructions on how to migrate from Small Business Server 2003 to Windows 2008 R2 with Exchange 2010. For this migration to work you will need the fo...
-
Create a Win7 Gadget
This article shows you how to create a simple "Gadget" -- a sort of mini-application supported by Windows 7 and Vista. Gadgets can be dropped anywhere on the desktop to provide instant information, ...
-
Outlook continually prompting for username and password
There have been a lot of questions recently regarding Outlook prompting for a username and password whilst using Exchange 2007. There are a few reasons why this would happen and I will try to cover t...
-
Backup Exchange 2010 Information Store using Windows Backup
There seems to be quite a lot of confusion around the ability to backup Exchange 2010 using the built in Windows Backup feature. This stems from the omission of this feature prior to Exchange 2007 s...
Cloud Class Webinars
- Avoiding Bugs in Microsoft Access
Alison Balter takes and in-depth look at avoiding bugs in Access. In this webinar you will learn about using the immediate window to debug your applications, invoking the debugger, using breakpoints to troubleshoot, stepping through code, setting the next statement to execute, ...
- Top 10 Best New Features in Visio 2010
Scott Helmers gives live demonstrations of the top 10 new features in Visio 2010. This webinar will teach you how to create compelling diagrams by adding shapes to the page with a single click, linking the shapes in a diagram to data in Excel (or SQL Server, or SharePoint), ...
- IT Consultant Business Secrets Revealed
Michael Munger, Experts Exchange tech pro and IT consultant, pulls back the curtain on his very successful businesses and answers question on every IT consultant and business owner should know about. He shares secrets on what he did to solve the 5 most common problems in IT, ...
- Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity
Quest CTO, Mike Billon, gives an overview of the steps involved in building a dunamic disaster recovery plan. Through case studies and an examination of software/hardware tooles for monitoring and testing, you'll gain a better understandin of where you are, where you want ...
- Organize Your Visio Diagrams with Containers and Lists
Scott Helmers uses cross functional flowcharts, wireframe diagrams, data graphic legends and seating charts to teach you: how to ustilize all three new structured diagram components in Visio 2010, the best practices for organizeing shapes in previous version of Visio, how to organize ...
- How to Us Objects, Properties, Events and Methods in Microsoft Access
Alison Dalter gives an in-depbth look at objects, properties, events and methods in Microsoft Access. In this webinar you will learn about using the object browser, referring to objects, working with properties and methods, working with object variables, understanding the ...
Join the Community
Give a Little. Get a Lot.
Join the community of experts here and help other tech pros by answering question in your area of expertise. You can earn FREE access to all Experts Exchange's premium features and resources.
Answers
OBCT,
I read this
'starts from 0, then accelerates at an even pace to drive straight while driving "d" and finishes at the exact time specified by "t" '
as starting from 0 and accelarating at a constant rate until a disatnce d has been travelled been travelled in a time t.
Starting with a speed 0 then a time T the speed V is and the distance travelled D at any given time T is
V = a*T
D = 0.5aT²
however as I read you want to know what is the accelaration required to travel a distance d in a given time t ie find a such that
d = 0.5at²
which gives
a=2*d/t²
this may or may not be what you are looking for.
The dimensions of the accelaration, distance and time can be what ever you want but must be constistent eg
d=miles t=hours v= miles per hour a=miles per hour per hour
or
d=feet t= seconds v=feet per second a=ft per second per second
GfW
OBCT,
You can set the acceleration as I have put in my above post as:
a = d / (0.5*t*t)
which is the same as what GwynforWeb has posted.
Another way would be
a = Driving Force of Car / Mass of Car
However then you can keep either 'd' or 't' fixed and find the other. In other words once acceleration is fixed then you can ask for 'd' and calculate 't' or vice-versa.
Dhyanesh
I tried using the formula for the first time (I couldn't before because of programming that had to be done) and I am not sure if I got the correct answer.
I used this:
a = d / (0.5*t*t)
which became
a = .4 / (0.5 * 10 * 10) // .4 is 400 meters & 10 is 10 seconds
The answer I got was = 8x10 -3
I have no idea what that means or how to use it.
Dear Mr. OBCT,
You kno what is acceleration it is the rate of change of speed. If a car is running at speed of 150 km/hr (constant) its acceleration is zero! Yes its zero. If you say that car reaches speed of 60 mts/sec in 1 second then the acceleration of car is 60 mtr/sec2 (second square). The formula for acceleration is a = speed / time. Weight of car will not play any role where as the speed and time will help you out. (Subs titute in above formula)
so,
acceleration = speed / time
Take speed in mts/sec, time in sec (you will get exact acceleration)
(u take speed in mts/sec & time in sec)
(1000 mts = 1 Km)
(1 mile = 1.6 km)
(1 minute = 60 sec)
(1 hour = 3600 sec)
Ps.: mts = meters, Km = kilo meters, sec = seconds
A bit late in the day - haven't looked at this section for a while.
dhyanesh gave Newton's equations in the first reply - these of course apply only for a constant rate of acceleration which is what you specified.
Any units can be used provided they are consistent, for example if the distance is in metres and the time in seconds then the speed must be metres/second and the acceleration in metres/second/second.
As everyone has said, weight doesn't come into these calculations. However, weight (or more correctly, mass) does determine how much force is needed to produce a given rate of acceleration. (Isaac Newton again, Force = Mass times Acceleration).
3 Ways to Join
Business Accounts
- Perfect for organizations
- Multiple users
- Save over 36%
- Create a Business Account
Answer for Membership
- Earn free access
- Showcase your knowledge
- No credit card required
- Sign Up to Answer
Loading Advertisement...
by: dhyaneshPosted on 2003-12-26 at 08:06:34ID: 10002333
Hi OBCT,
First of all car weight will not affect the acceleration or speed.
There are 3 basic kinematic equations which are used to solve problems like this. (You might need only one)
v = u + a*t
d = ut + 0.5*a*t*t
v*v = u*u + 2*a*d
where
u - initial speed
v - final speed
a - accleration
t - time
d - distance
From second equation:
In your case initial speed = 0 hence u = 0. Therefore second equation becomes
d = 0.5*a*t*t
Hence a = d/(0.5*t*t) which is your required acceleration.
Then once acceleration is fixed speed at any time 't' can be found from first formula (again u = 0)
v = a*t
Weight will come into picture only if you have the driving force of the car. Then acceleration would be :
a = Force / Mass
Dhyanesh