Question

What is the acceleration of free fall ?

Answer 1

Hint: A free falling object means that the object is falling under the sole influence of gravity. There will be no air resistance when an object is free falling. In Newton Physics the free fall is when a motion is taken place of a body there will be only one force acting upon it that is gravity.

Complete step-by-step solution -
The free fall motion has the effect of acceleration because of gravity. Let's take an object which is freely falling for t seconds from height h, due to gravity g. Now the equations of motions are as follows;
$$\begin{gathered} (i)h={\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}g{t}^2 \\ (ii)v^2=2gh \\ (iii)v=gt \end{gathered}$$

The above equations are derived from the usual equations by substituting initial velocity $u=0$.As the object starts free falling its initial velocity is zero as it is dropped from rest.
Now we know that free fall is a motion where acceleration remains constant i.e. g which is equal to $9.8m/s^2$. The acceleration of a free fall object is $9.8m/s^2$ and its direction is downwards towards earth. It is also called ‘acceleration of gravity’. A noticeable point here that is without the air resistance an object free falls and would be accelerating by $9.8m/s^2$means free fall acceleration is constant as the gravitational force acting upon is constant.

Note: We have gained information here that when an object is in a free fall condition, it is in a state of acceleration. Its velocity is changing with $9.8m/s^2$ every second and direction is downward. We can calculate its height from where the object is dropped and the time by above three equations.