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Re: Impulse



On Wed, 31 Oct 2001, Justin Parke wrote:

I think my question was misunderstood.

I don't think so.

I understand the concept of impulse as the time integral of a
force. This definition remains true regardless of the time
interval. In other cases "an impulse" means a force over a
vanishingly small time interval (like a hammer striking a
bowling ball).

Not "vanishing," *just* small!

These uses of the term impulse are not identical.

That is true because the second one is not used. Impulse is always
defined as the integral of a given force over a given time
interval. For a *briefly applied* force to produce much impulse it
must be relatively *large.*

John Mallinckrodt mailto:ajm@csupomona.edu
Cal Poly Pomona http://www.csupomona.edu/~ajm