Question

You have been hired as one of the large-scale props designer for the next Star Wars movie. There is one scene where an x-wing fighter plane crashes on the ground and slides up a 5° slope until it grinds to a halt by friction, but then it slides back down. The director does not want to use CGI, because it is not “real”. Your colleague has already built a 200 kg plane model and has designed the launch mechanism to get the plane to travel at 3.0 m/s when it starts from the bottom of the slope. The fighter and the slope are both made of steel, and you add oil to maximize the sliding.

a) How long a slope will you need?

b) What speed will the plane have when it gets back to the bottom of the slope again?

Answer 1