Look at the next problem below (the one about the ball bouncing off a wall). It

Question

Look at the next problem below (the one about the ball bouncing off a wall). It turns out that the y-component of the ball's velocity stays the same in the collision. Your job in this essay is to provide a force-based argument why that happens.

Hint: The wall can only exert one kind of force on the ball during the contact period of the bounce. That would be a normal force...

Note the picture is meant to be a bird's-eye view of the event, which is happening on the floor. The force of gravity does act on the ball, but it's directed into the computer screen. The floor that holds the ball up exerts a normal force directed out of the computer screen. Those cancel each other out, so we only care about the motion shown in the picture.

Explanation / Answer

Problem is saying that the y-componet of ball's velocity does not changes means there is force acitn in that direction

consider the direction along the wall is Y-axis and direction normal to the wall is X-axis

since given that only force is acting (Normal force) i.e along x-axis

according to Newton's laws Fnet = m*a

if there is no force means Fnet = 0 results accelaration a 0 means that there is no change in velocity

hence there is no change in the y-component of velocity

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