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Home Q & A Board Science-Related Homework Help Physics
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12 years ago
When a ball undergoes a one-dimensional elastic collision with a wall, the velocity of the ball is reversed, while the wall remains stationary. Explain why this does not violate conservation of momentum.
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12 years ago
One can regard this as the collision of the ball with a very massive object. As the mass of the object is increased, its speed after the collision becomes smaller and smaller. In the limiting case of an infinite mass, that mass does not move and the ball's velocity is reversed. The momentum is still conserved, but since the mass of the wall is essentially infinite, its velocity is infinitesimal.
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