studentteacher Posted February 11, 2017 Share Posted February 11, 2017 You travel 3 m north in 1s, and 4 m east 2 s. Displacement: 5 m in 3s. Average veolcity is 5/3 m/s. or V north = 3 m/s, and v east = 2 m/s. Average velocity for trip is (allegedly) 3.6 m/s. Obviously this wrong, but conceptually I'm not quite sure how to explain why it doesn't work. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
swansont Posted February 11, 2017 Share Posted February 11, 2017 You travel 3 m north in 1s, and 4 m east 2 s. Displacement: 5 m in 3s. Average veolcity is 5/3 m/s. or V north = 3 m/s, and v east = 2 m/s. Average velocity for trip is (allegedly) 3.6 m/s. Obviously this wrong, but conceptually I'm not quite sure how to explain why it doesn't work. For the latter, the duration of the trips is not the same. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DrKrettin Posted February 12, 2017 Share Posted February 12, 2017 For a start, you must distinguish between speed and velocity. Velocity is a vector and has one component of speed and the other of direction. Speed is just a scalar quantity. Are you asking about average speed (easy) or average velocity (not quite so easy)? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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