Force Diagram Practice
No Components
Each object touching the subject (object of interest) potentially exerts a force on it. In addition, there may be a non-contact force such as gravity caused by an object which does not touch the subject. However, all forces acting on a subject at any time are caused by other objects that are interacting with the subject at that time. Forces are not stored in the subject. (For example, a hand that throws a ball into the air exerts a force on the ball only while touching it; once the ball leaves the hand, there is no longer any force on the ball from the hand.)
For the following problems, draw the requested force diagram. Do not break contact forces into normal and/or frictional components. The Red Dot is an indication of the sum of the forces (net force) that you have drawn at any given time; the direction of the net force is given in red in the upper left corner of the applet. Briefly, from reading the problem you will need to determine whether the net force should be zero or not. Then change the direction and/or magnitude of one or more of the force vectors to put the dot at the center (for zero net force) or in the correct direction (for non-zero net force).