Our story so far…Dan and Maria are at the carnival riding on the Ferris wheel. Dan wonders what simple machine the operator pushes and pulls to start and stop it.

Answer: A second class lever!

P.S. Resistance arm +

fulcrum

More scienceWhen the Ferris wheel is moving its fastest, Dan and Maria are accelerating because the keep changing direction.

(The two dots are Dan and Maria)

(constantly moving)

Even More Science…

A Ferris wheel has a motor that makes it turn. But Dan wonders when it has to work its hardest to over come inertia based on Newton's first law of motion.

When it’s starting!

Still more scienceMaria knew that the Ferris wheel reaches its top speed more quickly with less people (light mass) and slower with more people (heavy mass). But which motion law of Newton explains that?

More mass=slower

Less mass=faster Aghh!

His second one!

Now let’s move on…

Now we go to Hiro and Dana, possibly at the same carnival as Dan and Maria. They are at the parachute ride. It’s a ride that lifts you up into the air and you parachute down. Hiro plus his parachute weigh 400 newtons. A newton is the measurement that tells how much it takes to pull or lift. Dana weighs 320 newtons with her parachute. To find the work it takes to lift them up, you take the force x times the distance it took. The distance to the top is 40 feet. So…

400 x 40= 1,600 so it took 1,600 joules of work to lift Hiro…

And 12,800 joules to lift Dana

More measuring…

It takes 30,000 newtons to lift Meg’s dad to the top of the ride. He got there in 6 seconds. (pretty quick I would say) He wonders how much power is used to lift him up.

5,000 power is used because to find power you must divide the work by the time. So 6 -:- 30,00 = 5,000.