The tension in a 2 m length of string that whirls a 1 kg mass at 4 m/s in a horizontal circle is calculated to be 8 N. How do you alculate the tension for the following case: twice the mass?

1 Answer
Michael
Nov 12, 2015

16"N"

Explanation:

The tension in the string is balanced by the centripetal force.

This is given by F=(mv^2)/r

This is equal to 8"N".

So you can see that, without doing any calculations, doubling m must double the force and hence the tension to 16"N".

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