Physics My Foot

Three days ago I pushed a cow out of an airplane in the air.  The following glogster will demonstrate the physics stuff going on with the cow.  Cow picture courtesy of  http://www.prospect.org/csnc/blogs/ezraklein_archive?month=04&year=2009&base_name=the_great_amendment_hunt_leave

Dazed Confused and Dizzy

Centripetal Force,  is the force that allows uniform circular motion. As Newton said an object in motion tends to stay in motion at the same speed and direction unless acted on by an unbalanced force.  Therefore it is necassary to have a force to keep an object in circular motion.  The centripetal force is always in the direction of the center of the circle the object is moving around.   Knowing this and the equations for centripital force and acceleration I can now find the acceleration, mass, velocity, and necessary centripetal force for the object to stay in circular motion.  Most of my troubles with centripetal force have come when the centripetal force has x and y components.  Of course to find these components all one has to do is use cosine and sine of theta multiplied by the magnitude of the resultant force.  The problem I have had is putting the components in to the proper equations for centripetal force after I get them.  Now I know however that once I have the components I just drop them into the correct equation whether it be ac=v^2/r  or Fc =mv^2/r or T=1/f  etc. As for universal gravitation my problems rested in scientific notation and the fact that I sometimes cut corners as far as showing my work and this caused me to make errors in calculations.