Re: [Phys-l] Interactive Physics Simulations

[Hugh Haskell <hhaskell@mindspring.com>]

At 10:35  -0400 10/12/06, Rick Tarara wrote:
> I maybe haven't read this thread carefully enough, but could someone define
> what a 'totally' inelastic collision actually is?  In my mind, an elastic
> collision conserves both momentum and kinetic energy while an inelastic
> collision conserves momentum but not KE.  It's the 'totally' that is
> confusing me here.
I don't know how others may treat it, but I look at the collision  in 
the center of mass frame, and define a totally inelastic collision to 
be one in which the post-collision kinetic energy is zero. A totally 
elastic collision is one in which the post-collision k.e. is the same 
as the pre-collision value. Anything in between, where the 
post-collision k.e. is somewhere between zero and the pre-collision 
value is called either partially elastic or partially inelastic 
(usually the former, since the latter isn't really great English).

Hugh
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Hugh Haskell
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