Jez's Blog

Newton's laws of motions, and frictions, are everywhere in our daily life. Let me give you an example:

Last Friday was HIS' field trip to Leofoo Village amusement park. Let's pick on Newton's 1st law of motions, 'an object at rest tends to stay at rest and an object in motion tends to stay in motion with the same speed and in the same direction unless acted upon by an unbalanced force,' as an example: The first ride that Grace, my partner, and I went on was 'Volcano Adventure' (if u translate it from Chinese into English). How did Newton's 1st law of motions apply on the ride? Well it might be hart to see because everything was in controled by machines. However, the most obvious observation was that in the end of the ride, Grace leant foreward when the boat stopped; and the reason why was because that while the boat was stopped by the machine, there was no other force to stop Grace and mine motions of moving foreward.

Further, the ride on 'Volcano Adventure' was also an example for both kinetic friction, and static friction. When the static energy was greater than the kinetic energy, the speed of the boat slowed down. Which was what happened when the boat was stopping in the end of the ride. I think the machine had somehow increased the static friction between the track and the bottom of the boat, and then caused it to stop eventually. Also, in addition, I wonder if when the boat was sliding down from the ramps, its kinetic friction increases because when it slid down from the ramps, its speed increased. However, again, it's hard to prove this point from this case because everything was in controled by mashines. Hwo knows if they also controled the speed of the boats or not?

P.S. LeoFoo Village was FUNNN!! :D