Projectile with Air Drag
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The plots show projectile motion with air resistance (red) compared with the same motion neglecting air resistance (blue). The projectile is launched at an angle with initial velocity . The force due to air resistance is assumed to be proportional to the magnitude of the velocity, acting in the opposite direction.
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Contributed by: Enrique Zeleny (April 2009)
Open content licensed under CC BY-NC-SA
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Details
The equations of motion for the and directions are given by
,
where increases upward and is a positive constant. The terminal velocity is given by , so the equations can be simplified to
.
For a projectile launched at an angle , and .
Integration of the equations of motion gives
,
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