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Hi Denny, thanks for the analysis. You highlight a model in which the front ends of the cars deform with uniform force over time and space versus...
Jim, These questions are considerably more difficult because we have to make assumptions about the front ends of the cars and how they deform....
Please see my lead ball and spring analogy. The more deformable object will tend to absorb more energy than the less deformable object. In your...
windstrings, let me try to address your main misconception: You make the claim that two objects that collide absorb the same amount of energy...
You know the Car Talk guys on NPR? Here's some of their advice: Avoiding the Blind Spot I've been using this technique for two years now, and...
Jim, I got your back! :) Let me try to explain. I think the major source of confusion is that people want the wall to absorb half of the energy....
Yes, I'm happy we can all have a positive attitude during our fun physics discussion! :D But I am a little embarassed to be contributing so...
If you went to an ice rink, you could try smashing dough balls into each other on the ice. It would be hard to control the speed and direction of...
In a physically idealized world, both should take exactly the same amount of damage. This is sort of clear if you visualize the accident from a...
No, it seems we both agree that the Prius' velocity changes by 60 mph in both scenarios. Maybe you misunderstood my parenthetical statement. I...
This won't do much damage at all since it only exists in GM's dreams! :lol:
Interestingly, the change in velocity for the occupants of the Prius (and similarly for the Escalade) is the same in both situations: 60 mph. So...
This is extremely bad advice. Speeding up will only increase the amount of kinetic energy the crash will have to dissapate. It does not decrease...
One of the things I like most about this website is that people are usually very friendly with each other, even when they don't agree. Please try...
When Jim and I were referring to a fixed barrier, we meant a barrier that absorbs a negligible amount of energy compared to the car. The car...
windstrings, Jim is right about this. his point is that since there's twice as many cars absorbing twice as much energy, the amount of energy...
Hmm... okay, so I definitely shouldn't leave it alone because of rust, right? I'm leaning towards just taking it to a body shop, especially if...
Hi everyone! I'm looking for some advice on how to treat a scratch on my Prius. My wife scraped a pole while backing into a space and it...
Wow, lots of CS and EE here... I guess that's not too surprising. AB in Applied Math/Computer Science working on a PhD in Computer Science I...
This isn't quite right. If two vehicles, each of the same mass going 25 mph, collide head on, they will both decelerate from 25 mph to 0 mph....
