Free Body Diagrams / Resultant Forces

This lesson covers:

1What a 'free body diagram' is

2What a 'resultant force' is

3How to calculate a resultant force from a free body diagram

4What it means for an object to be in 'equilibrium'

Diagram showing an airplane with arrows indicating lift, weight, air resistance, and thrust forces.

forces / direction / magnitude / type


Free body diagrams use arrows to show all of the acting on an object. 


The length of each arrow indicates the of that force.


The direction of each arrow indicates the of the force.

forces
magnitude
direction

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The force is the overall force acting on an object, taking into account all the different forces acting on it.

resultant

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Forces acting in opposite directions on the same object can 'cancel out'.


During take-off, a plane has a lift force (upwards force) of 690,000 N and a weight (downwards force) of 600,000 N.


What is the resultant force acting on the plane?

1.15 N upwards

90,000 N downwards

1.15 N downwards

90,000 N upwards

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A resultant force acts upon an object.


Which two properties might be affected by that resultant force?

Speed and direction

Direction and mass

Density and speed

Direction and temperature

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Diagram showing a pink cube with a 20N force acting to the left and a 10N force acting to the right.

What will be the resultant force acting upon this object?

(force arrows are not drawn to scale)

0 N - no resultant force

10 N to the left

10 N to the right

20 N to the right

10 N to the left

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Diagram showing a box with force arrows of 5N and 30N acting on it.

What will be the resultant force acting upon this object?

(force arrows are not drawn to scale)

2 N to the right

0 N - no resultant force

25 N to the left

30 N to the left

25 N to the right

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Diagram showing a blue cube with force arrows labeled 60N to the right, 45N to the left, and 15N to the left.

What will be the resultant force acting upon this object?

(force arrows are not drawn to scale)

45 N to the left

15 N to the left

60 N to the right

60 N to the left

0 N - no resultant force

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If all the forces acting on an object balance out, then we say that the object is in:

Freefall

Motion

Equilibrium

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Diagram of a train with forces acting on it in equilibrium showing 1700 N to the left and 900 N to the right with a missing force.

The train above is travelling at a constant velocity because the forces acting on it are in equilibrium. 


Therefore, the missing force must have a magnitude of newtons to the .

800
right

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