A car, which is accelerating uniformly from rest, travels a distance of 28.5 m in the tenth second of its motion. What is its acceleration?

The only thing I can think of is to use v=u+at, where u = 0 m/s, t = 10 s and v = 28.5 m/s. But the velocity is constantly increasing so the final velocity value is incorrect. Hmm.

Answer 1

The acceleration is #"3 m/s"^2#.

Assuming the car has an acceleration of #a#, the initial velocity will be #"0 m/s"# since the vehicle was at rest. Applying this to Newton's Second Law of Motion, we obtain

#28.5# is equal to #0 * 10 + 1/2 * a * 10^2 -(0 * 9 + 1/2 * a * 9^2)

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Answer 2

William Audy

The acceleration of the car is 5.7 m/s².

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Answer from HIX Tutor

When evaluating a one-sided limit, you need to be careful when a quantity is approaching zero since its sign is different depending on which way it is approaching zero from. Let us look at some examples.