Home Practice
For learners and parents For teachers and schools
Textbooks
Full catalogue
Leaderboards
Learners Leaderboard Classes/Grades Leaderboard Schools Leaderboard
Pricing Support
Help centre Contact us
Log in

We think you are located in United States. Is this correct?

1.4 Chapter summary

1.4 Chapter summary (ESBKF)

Presentation: 23FX

  • A vector has a magnitude and direction.

  • Vectors can be used to represent many physical quantities that have a magnitude and direction, like forces.

  • Vectors may be represented as arrows where the length of the arrow indicates the magnitude and the arrowhead indicates the direction of the vector.

  • Vectors in two dimensions can be drawn on the Cartesian plane.

  • Vectors can be added graphically using the head-to-tail method or the tail-to-tail method.

  • A closed vector diagram is a set of vectors drawn on the Cartesian using the tail-to-head method and that has a resultant with a magnitude of zero.

  • Vectors can be added algebraically using Pythagoras' theorem or using components.

  • The direction of a vector can be found using simple trigonometric calculations.

  • The components of a vector are a series of vectors that, when combined, give the original vector as their resultant.

  • Components are usually created that align with the Cartesian coordinate axes. For a vector \(\vec{F}\) that makes an angle of \(\theta\) with the positive \(x\)-axis the \(x\)-component is \(\vec{R}_x=R\cos(\theta)\) and the \(y\)-component is \(\vec{R}_y=R\sin(\theta)\).

temp text