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Old 02-03-2007, 12:43 AM   #33
graywolf624
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Join Date: Oct 2003
Location: Hellaware USA
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However, in the real world, there is drag, and items will obviously fall at different speeds, and the more aerodynamically efficient ones will fall quicker. Still, weight will not be relevant. Right?
Let me say first that I have very little background in fluids. In terms of modeling it with physics, your starting to get over my head when you get into drag.

That being said I am sure the mass of the object falling is important, but other aspects are as well. With aerodynamic drag there are so many factors you probably could not get the same result with 2 runs of the same object. Some of these include the surface area of the object, shape of the object, and speed of the object.
Then you have density of the air, temperature of the air, pressure, direction of air flow, etc (which are all interrelated.)

The air provides a force to the object pushing up.. the object pushes down on the air. Remember from the equations above the force of the falling object is f=m1a where a is a constant 9.8 m/s^s.
So now we pick a heavier m1. The force of the heavier object falling is now higher since we just showed its non earth relative acceleration is constant. This means if it hits the air and encounters the same friction force (aka all else equal), the net force pushing downwards afterwards will be higher then that of a lighter object. A great F with the same mass means a greater acceleration. Thus a heavier object all else being equal will have a higher resistance (momentum) to the slowing effect of the airodynamic drag.


Info on calculated drag and the like.
http://hypertextbook.com/physics/matter/drag/
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