The shock absorbers in a car act
as a big spring with .
When a 92.5 kg person gets in,
how far does the spring stretch?
(Hint: How much force does the person exert
on the car?)
(Unit = m)

To find out how far the spring stretches when a 92.5 kg person gets in, we first need to calculate the force exerted by the person due to gravity. This can be done using the formula , where is the acceleration due to gravity, approximately .

So, the force is:

Next, we can use Hooke’s Law, which states that the force exerted by a spring is proportional to its displacement, expressed as , where is the spring constant and is the displacement (how far it stretches). Rearranging the formula gives us:

Now, plugging the values into the equation:

So, the spring stretches approximately or .