In a supermarket parking lot, an employee is pushing ten empty shopping carts, lined up in a straight line. The acceleration of the carts is 0.080 m/s2. The ground is level, and each cart has a mass of 25 kg.

Question

(a) What is the net force acting on any one of the carts?
N
(b) Assuming friction is negligible, what is the force exerted by the fifth cart on the sixth cart?
N

Answer 1

(a) The net force acting on any single cart can be obtained from F = m a
(b) The force acting on the sixth cart must be enough to accelerate carts 6 through 10. Use F = m a again, but the m is defferent.