Question

A gardener is designing a support to keep a tree upright. Two wires have been attached to the tree and placed at right angles to each other. One wire exerts a force of 30.0 N on the tree, the other wire exerts a 40.0 N force. Determine where to place a third wire and how much force it should exert so that the net force acting on the tree is equal to zero.

a. Along the line of the 30.0 N force with 40.0 N force
b. Along the line of the 40.0 N force with 30.0 N force
c. Perpendicular to both existing wires with 50.0 N force
d. Perpendicular to both existing wires with 10.0 N force

Answer 1

To cancel out the net force on the tree, the third wire should be placed perpendicular to both existing wires and exert a force of 50.0 N.

Step-by-step explanation:

To determine where to place the third wire and how much force it should exert, we need to analyze the forces acting on the tree. The two existing wires are exerting forces of 30.0 N and 40.0 N on the tree. Since the net force acting on the tree is zero, the third wire must cancel out the combined force of the other two wires. The third wire should be placed perpendicular to both existing wires and exert a force of 50.0 N.