Every day, thousands of people wait an hour or more in line for a two-minute ride on a rollercoaster. To them, it's worth the wait in order to experience the thrill of having one's body thrown about at great speeds and one's perception of danger spiked and quenched. And now we look into the science of what gives us those thrills.
Rollercoasters constantly shift between tapping into potential and kinetic energy. The kinetic energy gained when the train travels down the first hill – or fires out of the launch – gets it up the next, smaller hill. As it travels up the hill, it loses kinetic energy and gains potential energy, and the cycle starts again. Many newer rollercoasters also include further launches, which are often electromagnetic, that provide the train with additional kinetic energy part way through the ride.
Most people like to sit at the front or the back of the train, with many rides offering separate queues for these prime spots. In these positions riders feel a greater sense of weightlessness, explains Ann-Marie Pendrill, an expert in using rollercoasters in physics education at the University of Gothenburg and Lund University in Sweden. Pendrill adds that the middle of the train is where one experiences the highest G-forces, but not many people choose to sit there. “The force if you are sitting in the middle will really be more straight up to you, not sideways, not back to front. It will be more or less the way it should be theoretically.”
That's just a small excerpt from a strangely comprehensive and understandable explanation of the physics involved in a rollercoaster ride that you can read at Physics World. -via Damn Interesting
(Image credit: Cz98)
