Yet Another Book Stacking Problem: How many books are required? (Try 2, editor issue)
The problem's question: How many books are required so that the far edge of the last placed book is more than two book lengths beyond the table top edge?
You may assume that the books are rigid rectangular parallelepipeds of uniform density, that they mass 0.8kg, they are measure 245mm by 172mm by 30mm, that the table is a rigid motionless 1m cube, that you can place the books with absolute precision without disturbing the table or the already placed books, that the long edge of the books is perpendicular to the table top and the table top is perpendicular to the local gravitational vertical, that the gravitational field is uniform and non-diverging in the work area and there is no air flow. In other words, this is a mathematical problem and not a real-world physics problem.
For the curious only, the book parameters are modeled on my copy of РУССКАЯ АМЕРИКА.
The answer is 31.
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1 solution
This is a book stacking problem . The first harmonic number with a value greater than 2 putting the outward edge of that book more than 1 beyond the table edge is the thirty-first book.
Before you say that I didn't explain the computation, go read the links.