| Questions | 5 |
| Topics | Drag, Gear Trains, Inertia, Normal Force vs. Weight, Weight |
Drag is friction that opposes movement through a fluid like liquid or air. The amount of drag depends on the shape and speed of the object with slower objects experiencing less drag than faster objects and more aerodynamic objects experiencing less drag than those with a large leading surface area.
Connected gears of different numbers of teeth are used together to change the rotational speed and torque of the input force. If the smaller gear drives the larger gear, the speed of rotation will be reduced and the torque will increase. If the larger gear drives the smaller gear, the speed of rotation will increase and the torque will be reduced.
The more mass a substance has the more force is required to move it or to change its direction. This resistance to changes in direction is known as inertia.
Normal force arises on a flat horizontal surface in response to an object's weight pressing it down. Consequently, normal force is generally equal to the object's weight.
Mass is an intrinsic property of matter and does not vary. Weight is the force exerted on the mass of an object due to gravity and a specific case of Newton's Second Law of Motion. Replace force with weight and acceleration with acceleration due to gravity on Earth (g) and the result is the formula for weight: W = mg or, substituting for g, weight equals mass multiplied by 9.8 m/s2.