Newton’s Laws of Motion - Newton's First Law of Motion

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First Law of Motion

“An object will remain at rest or in uniform motion in a straight line unless acted upon by an external force.”

Also called the Law of Inertia, an object will stay at rest or in motion indefinitely, unless an external or unbalanced force acts upon this object.

The inertia of an object is dependent upon the mass of an object. The greater the mass of an object, the greater the inertia.

Eg: Water in a bottle continues moving forward even though the bottle has come to a halt.

 

Notes

Newton’s First law of motion

A body at rest tends to remain at rest and a body in uniform motion tends to remain in the state of uniform motion until & unless an external force is applied on it.

For example, a ball lying on the table at rest will remain at rest until an external force is applied to it.

Balanced & unbalanced forces:-

Balanced Forces:

  • Equal and opposite forces

  • Do not cause any change in motion

Unbalanced Forces:

  • Unequal forces

  • Can be in the same or opposite direction

  • Causes a change in motion


For example, in Tug of War, If teams 1 & 2 apply equal forces in opposite directions, there would be no net force. This is a Balanced force.
However, if Team 1 exerts more force than Team 2, then there would be a net movement towards Team 1 and Team 1 would win. This is an unbalanced force.

Momentum
Newton’s first law was for scenarios where net force = 0. The second law is for scenarios with a net force not equal to 0. Momentum plays a crucial role in the Second law.

  • Momentum is the product of the mass of a body & its velocity

  • It is a Vector quantity

  • It is denoted by p = mv

For example, A ball of 1 kg moving with 10m/sec has a momentum 10kg m/sec.

The momentum of a system remains conserved. Therefore,

  • Greater force is required to set heavier bodies in motion

     

  • Greater force is required to stop bodies moving with higher velocities

    Conclusion:
    The greater the change in momentum in a given time, the greater is the force that needs to be applied. In other words, the greater the change in momentum vector, the greater is the force applied.

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