What was the force that the wall exerted on the ball?

Question

A bouncy ball with a mass of 350 g is traveling at 25 m/s when it hits a wall at a 60 degree angle relative to the wall. If the ball rebounds at a 30 degree angle and traveling at 12 m/s, and impacted the wall for 0.625 seconds, what was the force that the wall exerted on the ball?

Please explain each step. Thank you!

Answer 1

Based on the problem you have defined that the angle of the ball with respect to the wall is 60 degrees. Since you did not specify that this is with respect to the normal of the wall, the problem will be solved with this in mind. The same goes for the rebound (after the force is applied).

The short answer is to resolve the velocity before and after the rebound into the X and Y components. You will then find the change in the momentum and set that equal to the impulse during the time the force is applied. After determining each force component, the components may be added using pythagorean theorem to detemine the magnitude of the force. The tangent relationship will help define the direction of the force.