Work and Energy

1. A 0.5-kg cart released from rest at the top of a smooth incline has gravitational energy
of 6 J relative to the base of the incline.
(a) Calculate the cart’s speed at the bottom of the incline.
(b) When the cart has rolled halfway down the incline, the cart’s gravitational
potential energy will be:
(A) Greater than 3 J
(B) Less than 3 J
(C) Equal to 3 J
Justify your answer.
(c) When the cart has rolled halfway down the incline, the cart’s kinetic energy will be
(A) Greater than 3 J
(B) Less than 3 J
(C) Equal to 3 J
(D) Unknown without knowledge of the cart’s speed
Justify your answer.
(d) When the cart has rolled halfway down the incline, the cart’s speed will be:
(A) Half of its speed at the bottom
(B) Greater than half of its speed at the bottom
(C) Less than half of its speed at the bottom
(e) A 1.0-kg cart is released from rest at the top of the same incline. At the bottom, it
will be moving
(A) Faster than the 0.5-kg cart
(B) Slower than the 0.5-kg cart
(C) The same speed as the 0.5-kg cart
2. A 0.1 kg stone sits at rest on top of a compressed vertical spring. The potential energy
stored in the spring-earth-stone system is 40 J. The spring is released, throwing the
stone straight up into the air.
(a) How much kinetic energy will the stone have when it first leaves the spring?
(b) How much gravitational energy, relative to the spot where the stone was released,
will the stone have when it reaches the peak of its flight?
(c) Calculate the height above the release point to which the stone travels.
(d) Suggest something we could change about this situation that would cause the
stone to reach a height double that calculated in Part (c).
3. In the laboratory, a motion detector records the speed of a cart as a function of time,
stopping its reading when the cart is 15 cm in front of the detector at the line marked
on the track. The cart is released from rest at the position shown.
(a) The kinetic energy of the cart at the line marked on the track is equal to the
gravitational energy mgh of the cart at its initial position. On the preceding
diagram, draw and label the distance you would measure for the height h of the
cart.
(b) Explain in some detail how commonly available laboratory equipment could be
used to measure the labeled height h .
(c) If the height h were doubled in a second trial, the motion detector would read
(A) The same speed as in the first trial
(B) Two times the speed in the first trial
(C) Four times the speed in the first trial
(D) times the speed in the first trial
Justify your answer.
4. Student A lifts a 50-N box from the floor straight up to a height of 40 cm in 2 s.
Student B lifts a 40-N box straight up from the floor to a height of 50 cm in 1 s.
(a) Compared to Student A, Student B does
(A) The same work but develops more power
(B) The same work but develops less power
(C) More work but develops less power
(D) Less work but develops more power
Justify your answer
(b) Now Student A instead lifts the 50-N box from the floor diagonally, moving the box
40 cm to the right and 40 cm upward in the same 2 s.
 (A) Compared to the work he did originally, does Student A do more, less, or the
same work?
(B) Compared to the power he developed originally, does Student A develop more,
less, or the same power?

Solutions to Practice Problems

1. (a) Here gravitational energy is converted to kinetic energy. (“Smooth” generally

means friction is negligible.) Kinetic energy at the bottom will be 6 J, which is equal
to ½mv 2 . Plug in the 0.5-kg mass of the cart and solve for v to get 4.9 m/s.
(b) Gravitational potential energy is mgh . Since the h term is in the numerator and not
squared or square rooted, cutting hin half cuts the whole equation in half as well; so
the cart’s gravitational potential energy will be 3 J.
(c) Any gravitational potential energy lost by the cart must be converted to kinetic
energy. The cart lost 3 J of gravitational energy, so the cart now has 3 J of kinetic
energy.
(d) At the bottom, to find the speed we set 6 J = ½mv 2 . Solving for the cart’s speed,

we get . We’re going to cut that 6 J term in half. Since the 6

J is under the square root, though, we don’t cut the speed in half; instead, we

multiply the speed by . If you don’t see why that gives a speed greater than

half the speed at the bottom, try carrying out the entire calculation—you should get
3.5 m/s.
(e) The energy conversion is the same—we’re setting gravitational energy (mgh ) at
the top equal to kinetic energy (½mv 2) at the bottom. Notice the mass on both
sides—the mass cancels, and so doesn’t affect the result. Thus, the speed is the
same for either cart. Again, feel free to do the calculation with m = 1.0 kg to get 4.9
m/s again.
2. (a) No forces external to the spring-earth-stone system act on the block. Therefore,
mechanical energy is conserved. The 40 J of potential energy is converted to the
stone’s kinetic energy, or 40 J.
(b) Again, mechanical energy is conserved. The 40 J of kinetic energy are now
converted entirely to 40 J of gravitational energy.
(c) That 40 J of gravitational energy at the peak can be set equal to mgh . Solve
for h to get 40 m.
(d) The energy conversion here is spring energy → gravitational energy.
Mathematically, that’s ½kx 2 = mgh . Solving for h, . To double the

height, we could use a spring with double the spring constant of the original spring,
because k is unexponented 8 in the numerator. We could compress the spring 1.4
times its original compression, since when the xin the numerator is squared that
would multiply the whole expression by 2. We could use a rock of mass 0.05 kg;
 with min the denominator, halving the mass doubles the entire expression. (Okay, I
suppose we could go to some new planet where g is 5 N/kg. If you will fund that
trip, I’ll give you credit for that answer.)
3. (a) In the equation mgh, h represents the vertical distance above the lowest position
or some reference point. Here the reference point is the line on the track. The
motion detector reads the front of the cart, so h must be measured to the front of
the cart, not the middle or back. See above for the answer.
(b) Use a meterstick, obviously, but it’s not an easy measurement to make. First,
measure the vertical distance from the desk to the line on the track 15 cm in front
of the detector. Then measure the vertical distance from the desk to the track
directly under the front of the cart; then subtract the two distance measurements.
You can get more accurate measurements if you use a bubble level and plumb bob
to ensure the table is horizontal and the measurements are vertical. (If you want to
measure along the track the distance from the front of the cart to the line, use an
angle measurer to get the angle of the track, then use trigonometry.)
(c) The energy conversion here is gravitational energy → kinetic energy. In equations,
that’s mgh = ½mv 2 . Solve for v to get . The variable h is in the

numerator but under the square root, so doubling h multiplies the speed by the
square root of 2, choice D.
4. (a) The work done by the student is equal to the change in the box’s gravitational
potential energy—that’s mgh . The time it takes the student to lift the box
doesn’t depend on time at all. Plugging in, we find that Student A does (5 kg)(10
N/kg)(0.40 m) = 20 J of work on the box. Student B does (4 kg)(10 N/kg)(0.50 m) =
20 J of work, also. Now, power is work divided by the time it takes to do that work.
Since they do the same amount of work, whoever takes less time to do the work
develops more power. That’s Student B. So the answer is choice A.
(b) (A) As above, the work done by Student A on the box is mgh . Here h represents
the vertical height above the lowest position. Since that vertical height is still 40 cm,
Student A has done the same work. (You could also recognize that the horizontal
displacement is not parallel to the box’s weight, or to the force Student A applied
to lift the box. 9 )
(B) Since the work done by Student A is the same as before, and it took the same
amount of time, the power (= work/time) is the same.
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