Losing Control
A car is making a smooth turn on wet pavement. If the safety brake is applied during the turn and the rear wheels stop rotating, the driver will lose control and the car will spin out. The same thing happens if the throttle is fully opened and the rear wheels start rotating very fast.
Which of the following statements are true?
A.
The direction of the friction force at the rear wheels changes. The torque around the center of mass of the car, created by this friction force, is abruptly reduced due to the change in the direction of the force.
B.
The torque around the center of mass of the car, created by the friction force at the front wheels, will make the car spin out.
C.
The difference between the static and kinetic frictions is the main reason for spinning out.
D.
The spinout can be prevented by steering the front wheels towards the center of the turn.
This section requires Javascript.
You are seeing this because something didn't load right. We suggest you, (a) try
refreshing the page, (b) enabling javascript if it is disabled on your browser and,
finally, (c)
loading the
non-javascript version of this page
. We're sorry about the hassle.
1 solution
A and B are correct. The difference between the static and kinetic friction (C) is not important here. Steering the front wheels towards the center of the turn (D) makes the situation worst.