Conservation of Energy?

During this wonderful snow day, we were assigned an even more wonderful physics assignment concerning the concept of conservation of energy and an example that would demonstrate this principle. In this example, I ventured outside into the vast outdoors. Outside on my front porch, I placed two soccer balls on the ground, one of which would remain stationary while the other would be given an initial velocity. With the two soccer balls on the ground and a ruler in the background for reference, I kicked the first soccer ball which would be propelled into the second, stationary ball, therefore transferring momentum and initiating some movement in the second ball while the first slowed to a stop.

Inserting this video into Logger Pro allowed me to analyze the two soccer balls and their velocities throughout the collision. The two graphs below are of the x-velocity values for each of the soccer balls.

Graph of First Soccerball

Graph of Second Soccerball

*(Values for velocity appear to be negative in each as a result of the motion within the video)*

Using these values, along with those obtained after weighing the two balls, I was able to insert values into the equations for momentum and energy in order to calculate and determine whether the collision was elastic or not. When doing this it was clear that the collision was not perfectly elastic as not all of the values matched up after working through the equations.

Through the inelastic collision of the soccer balls, an estimated total of 5.225 Joules of energy was lost in the interaction. There could be various explanations for this loss of energy, however, I believe there are a few effects that would have had large influences on the collision. These would include the fact that it was outside with wind and other elements, as well as one ball, having been flatter than the other as a result of a leak. With these and other outside effects as well as inaccuracies, I believe that the results obtained are accurate and that the collision was inelastic, losing energy through the motion.

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