You are on a train that is traveling at 3.0 m/s along a level straight track. Ve

Question

You are on a train that is traveling at 3.0 m/s along a level straight track. Very near and parallel to the track is a wall that slopes upward at a 12° angle with the horizontal. As you face the window (0.90 m high, 2.0 m wide) in your compartment, the train is moving to the left, as the drawing indicates. The top edge of the wall first appears at window corner A and eventually disappears at window corner B. How much time passes between appearance and disappearance of the upper edge of the wall?

Explanation / Answer

Start of by working out how far the train has to move (call it x) for the top of the wall to move from corner A to the corner immediately above corner A.

height of window / x = tan(12)

x = 0.9 / tan(12) = 4.234 m

For this point to disappear from the opposite top corner, the train will have to move an additional distance equal to the width of thewindow.

The train will therefore move a total 4.234m + 2.0 m =6.234 m

At 3.0m/s the train will cover this distance in 6.234 m /3.0 m/s= 2.078 s
Considering sig figs, this answer will round to 2.078 s

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