As Alan is taking a shower, the soap falls out of the dish and Alan steps on it with a force of 500 N. If Alan slides forward and the frictional force between the soap and the tub is 50 N, what is the coefficient of friction between these two surfaces?

Answer 1

Use the equation Friction Force (Ff) =mu*N
mu is a Greek letter representing the friction force and the N is the normal, or whatever the weight of the object is pushing down. So algebraically solve the equation by plugging in:
50=mu*500
50/500=mu so therefore 1/10=mu or 0.1 which is your answer

Answer 2

As Alan is taking a shower, the soap falls out of the soap dish and Alan steps on it with a force of 245.2 N. If Alan slides forward and the frictional force between the soap and the tub is 30.4 N, what is the coefficient of friction between these two surfaces?

g = 9.8 m/s2

FN = mg

Ff = μFN