AP Physics 1 : Work, Energy, and Power

Study concepts, example questions & explanations for AP Physics 1

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Example Questions

Example Question #41 : Work, Energy, And Power

A spaceship of mass  is motionless in space. The rocket is turned on and provides a constant force of . Assume the mass of mass due to spent fuel is negligible.

Determine the distance traveled in .

Possible Answers:

None of these

Correct answer:

Explanation:

Plugging in values

Using

Using

Using

Initially the space ship is motionless, so it has  kinetic energy

Example Question #42 : Work, Energy, And Power

A box is shoved and is sliding on a concrete floor. It has a mass of  and in  slows from  to . Determine the energy lost to friction.

Possible Answers:

 lost

 lost

 lost

 lost

None of these

Correct answer:

 lost

Explanation:

Example Question #43 : Work, Energy, And Power

A  woman has a jet pack that has a mass of . She ignites the jet pack and it accelerates her at a rate of . Determine the total work done by the jet pack when she has reached a height of .

Possible Answers:

None of these

Correct answer:

Explanation:

Example Question #44 : Work, Energy, And Power

A  super ball is dropped from a height of  and returns to the same height. Determine the work done by the ground on the ball.

Possible Answers:

Impossible to determine

Correct answer:

Explanation:

There will be no work done.

Energy is a scalar quantity. Since it has the same amount of energy in the end as the beginning, no work was done.

Alternatively, it can be modeled as the floor did negative work during the first half of the bounce (when the ball was compressing), and did positive work of the same magnitude and opposite sign in the second half of the bounce. This is due to the direction of the ball's motion flipping and the Force vector of the floor staying the same.

Example Question #45 : Work, Energy, And Power

A man throws a pizza  in the air. If he released it at a height of , and his throwing motion was a distance of  directly up, determine the average force of the man on the pizza during the throw.

Possible Answers:

None of these

Correct answer:

Explanation:

Based on the information given, his throw would have started at  above the ground. The pizza gained a maximum height of . Thus, the gravitational potential energy in relation to the starting position will be:

Since at it's maximum height, all of the energy will be gravitational, the work done on the pizza will be equal to the potential energy, thus:

Using

Example Question #81 : Ap Physics 1

 car is at rest at the bottom of a  hill.  later, it is at the top of the hill going . Find the net work done.

Possible Answers:

Correct answer:

Explanation:

Initially the car is at rest at the bottom of a hill, this velocity and height are zero.

Converting  to 

Plugging in values:

Example Question #81 : Ap Physics 1

A bulldozer pushes a rock with a constant force of  but the rock does not move.

How much work is done on the rock?

Possible Answers:

Correct answer:

Explanation:

The equation for work is:

Where  is the work done on an object,  is the force applied to an object,  is the distance the object moves, and  is the angle between the applied force and the direction the object moves.

From the problem statement we have:

 but .

Plugging in to our equation we find:

Because the rock does not move, no work is done on the rock. 

Note: the unit for work is shown to be  and a Newton-meter is the same as a Joule so  would also be an appropriate answer.

Example Question #48 : Work, Energy, And Power

A bulldozer pushes a rock with a constant force of  and the rock moves  in .

How much work is done on the rock?

Possible Answers:

Correct answer:

Explanation:

The equation for work is:

Where  is the work done on an object,  is the force applied to an object,  is the distance the object moves, and  is the angle between the applied force and the direction the object moves.

From the problem statement we have:

 and .

Plugging in to our equation we find:

We can assume that the bulldozer is pushing straight in to the rock because no information is given about the angle between the force and distance, so we can assume that  and  and that part of the formula can be ignored in this problem.

The time it takes to move the rock is superfluous information as work does not have a time component.

Note: the unit for work is shown to be  and a Newton-meter is the same as a Joule so  would also be an appropriate answer.

Example Question #49 : Work, Energy, And Power

A  block is thrown off of an airplane at a height of  from the ground. The block hits the ground with a final velocity of . Assume that , and that no forces other than gravity are acting on the block. What is the work done by gravity on the block?

Possible Answers:

Correct answer:

Explanation:

This question asks you how to calculate the work done by gravity on a block that is dropped from the air. Work is calculated by multiplying a given force by the distance over which the force acts. In this case, you are asked to find the work done strictly by the force of gravity on the block. The force of gravity works over the distance from which the block is dropped, to the ground (i.e. the height of the block, ). Thus, you can set up the equation as follows:

Therefore, the work done by gravity on the block is 

Example Question #41 : Work, Energy, And Power

How much work (in kilojoules) is done to accelerate a car (3000kg) from rest to .

Possible Answers:

5400 kilojoules

3000 kilojoules

3400 kilojoules

2300 kilojoules

6200 kilojoules

Correct answer:

5400 kilojoules

Explanation:

Work is found by finding the change in kinetic energy. Since the car started from rest it had no initial kinetic energy.

Divide by 1000 to convert to kilojoules and get 5400 kilojoules.

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