Centripetal Acceleration Problem Set
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1) A gravitron ride pushes passengers into a circle with its wall. It makes one
turn every 5 seconds and has a radius of 6 meters.
a. What is the speed of someone on the ride?
b. What is the centripetal acceleration of the person on the ride?
c. If they stick their head in towards the middle of the ride .3 meters
what is my new radius? Calculate my new centripetal acceleration.
2) What is the centripetal acceleration of the earth around the sun if the
distance from the earth to the sun is 1.5 × 1011 meters. Give answer in m/s2.
3) What is the centripetal acceleration of the moon around the earth if the moon
turns once around the earth every 27.3 days and the distance from the moon
to earth is 3.57 x 108 m.
4) At escape velocity an object can travel around the earth without touching the
ground because it is pulled down by gravity at the same rate the earth curves
away from it. Escape velocity is 7910 m/s and the radius of the earth is 6.378
x 106 m. Calculate the centripetal acceleration of an object traveling at
escape velocity around the earth.
5) A car barely takes a turn safely with a centripetal acceleration of 14.4 m/s2.
The turn has radius 10 m. What speed can the car safely make the turn with?
6) A roller coaster loop is shaped in a perfect circle. At the top of the loop the
rollercoaster car is moving with a velocity of 7 m/s. It has a centripetal
acceleration of 8 m/s2. What is the radius of the loop?
7) Given a satellite experiences a centripetal acceleration equal to 9.8 m/s2 and
is located 482,803 above the surface of the earth. What is the velocity of the
satellite? Hint: the radius of the earth is important in the calculation. Its
radius is 6.38 x 106 m.
Answers:
1) a. 7.53 m/s
b. 9.47 m/s2
c. 9 m/s2
2) .0059 m/s2
3) .0025 m/s2
4) 9.8 m/s2
5) 12 m/s
6) 6.13 m
7) 8200 m/s