Originally Posted By: paul
and the turnaround will not add any energy to the mass.


Correct. And of course we're talking about momentum, not energy, which I stated quite clearly.

Suppose a car has momentum of 1000. It crashes into a tree and stops. What's its new momentum? How much did it lose?

This point is crucial to it working or not. So we better clarify it before complicating things with constant accelerations.

Actually we can express it in an even clearer way. Suppose a car has velocity of 1000, it crashes into a tree and stops. What's its new velocity? What's the change in its velocity?

Sounds too simple doesn't it? But I'm curious what your answer will be.


Last edited by kallog; 06/20/10 03:29 AM.