Re: wheels come off - speed doubles?

[John Mallinckrodt <ajmallinckro@CSUPOMONA.EDU>]

On Mon, 20 May 2002, Jerry Hester wrote:

> I once upon a time lived in the middle of Kansas.  A farm truck
> overloaded with grain was traveling down the highway at no more than 20
> mph when a wheel came off.  The wheel rolled a good quarter mile through
> a field and practically destroyed my car sitting in my driveway.  I
> would assume that if the wheel comes off at the right point in it's
> rotation, the weight of the truck could impart a very significant
> rotational kinetic energy.
> An aside: When I finally had my car repaired and returned.  The next day
> I had people replacing the water heater.  They set it down on the porch,
> it rolled off and into the driveway and smashed the heck out of my
> fender.  That particular car was just not meant to be sitting in the
> driveway.

Sounds like that car was a "rolling object magnet."  Maybe that's
where the doubled KE comes from.

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