By now you understand that in a game of tug of war, if the two teams on opposite sides of the rope are pulling with an equal force, then the forces are balanced and the rope does not move. This can be explained by Newton’s first law.
While planning a school-wide tug-of-war contest, you realize that you have an uneven number of teams. If you let one team sit out of the first round and play against the winners, they will have an unfair advantage because their opponents will be tired. Your teacher has the bright idea to connect three ropes to a circular metal ring so that three teams can pull at the same time. In order to help ensure that the outing is not a flop, you need to design a simple experiment that can be performed on a tabletop, to determine if a 3-way tug-of-war can work, and what the angles between the ropes must be so that no team has an unfair advantage.
1. Describe your materials and methods needed to test the 3-way tug-of-war.
2. Examine the experiments suggested by your classmates, and suggest any improvements that might be needed in their experiments, or yours, based on what you have read.