Basic Mechanics (Statics and Dynamics)
139
2.
If
an
unbalanced system of forces acts upon
a
particle, it will accelerate in the
direction of the resultant force at
a
rate proportional to the magnitude of the
resultant force. This law expresses the relationship between force, mass, and
acceleration and may be written
as
F=Ma
(2-2)
where
F
is the resultant force, M is the mass of the particle, and
a
is the
acceleration
of
the particle.
3.
Contact forces between two bodies have the same magnitude, the same line of
action, and opposite direction.
Gmuitution.
Two particles in space are attracted toward each other by
a
force that
is proportional to the product of their masses and inversely proportional to the square
of
the distance between them. Mathematically this may be stated as
where
I
F
1
is the magnitude of the force of gravitational attraction,
G
is the universal
gravitational constant (6.673
x
10-"m3/kg
-
s2
or
3.44
x
10.' ft4/lb
-
s4),
m, and m2
are
the masses of particles
1
and 2, and r is the distance between the two particles.
Systems
of
Units
Two systems of units are in common usage in mechanics. The first, the
SI
system.
is an absolute system based
on
the fundamental quantities of space, time, and mass.
All
other quantities, including force, are derived.
In
the SI system the basic unit of
mass is the kilogram (kg), the basic unit of length (space) is the meter (m), and the
basic unit of time is the second
(s).
The derived unit of force is the Newton (N),
which is defined
as
the force required to accelerate a mass of
1
kg at
a
rate of
1
m/s'.
The
US.
customary
or
English system
of
units is a gravitational system based upon
the quantities of space, time, and force (weight).
All
other quantities including mass
are derived. The basic unit of length (space) is the foot (ft), the basic unit of time is
the second
(s),
and the basic unit of force is the pound (Ib). The derived unit of mass
is the
slug,
which is the unit
of
mass that will be accelerated by
a
force of one pound
at
a rate
of
1
ft/s2. To apply the slug in practice,
as
in Equation 2-2, the weight in
pounds
mass must first be divided by g
=
32.2 ft/s2, thus generating
a
working mass in
units of
lb
-
s2/ft, or slugs.
Statics
If there are
no
unbalanced forces acting
on
a
particle,
the particle is said to be in
static equilibrium, and Newton's second law reduces to
Thus, solving
a
problem in particle statics reduces to finding the unknown force
or forces such that the resultant force will be zero. To facilitate this process it is useful
to
draw
a
diagram showing the particle of interest and
all
the forces acting upon
it.
This is called
afree-body diagram.
Next
a
coordinate system (usually Cartesian) is
superimposed
on
the free-body diagram, and the forces are decomposed into their