Can inertia be used as a force for propulsion?
In: 9
No, inertia is the resistance to change in motion, not a force the closest thing you could do to this is have a heavy object hit a small object at a low speed, sending the small object off at a high speed, but this is just conservation of momentum, not using inertia as a force.
You can do that yourself if you hold a tennis ball on top of a basketball and drop both at the same time. When it bounces, the tennis ball gets rocketed up, and the basketball barely bounces at all.
A rocket also does a similar thing. It sends the fuel backwards very fast so the rocket can go forwards, but again, this is just conservation of momentum.
Latest Answers