A Monash College student of mass70 kg standing in an elevator briefly experiences a constant upward vertical speed of 2 m/s as he moves from level 2 to level 6. What is apparent weight of the student at this moment?

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BlackTom AI · Accepted Answer

The situation describes a student in an elevator moving upward at a constant speed. When an object moves with constant velocity, its acceleration is zero. In this case, there is no net force causing a change in the student's speed, so the only force the scale (or apparent weight) experiences is the gravitational pull acting downward, with no additional inertial force from acceleration.

Therefore, the apparent weight equals the true gravitational weight, which is mg, where m is the mass and g is the acceleration due to gravity.

Compute the weight: m = 70 kg, g ≈ 9.8 m/s^2, so weight W = mg ≈ 70 × 9.8 = 686 N (approximately 6.86 × 10^2 N).

If the elevator were accelerating upward, the apparent weight would be greater than mg; if it were accelerating downward, the apparent weight would be less than mg. In this particular moment with constant velocity (zero acceleration), the apparent weight matches the gravitational weight exactly.

Note: The provided answer option states "Equal to the gravitational weight force," which aligns with this reasoning, and the numerical value would be about 686 N using g ≈ 9.8 m/s^2.

A Monash College student of mass70 kg standing in an elevator briefly experiences a constant upward vertical speed of 2 m/s as he moves from level 2 to level 6. What is apparent weight of the student at this moment?

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