ARELLANO UNIVERSITY – MALABON

Gen. Luna cor. Esguerra St., Barangay Bayan-Bayanan, Malabon City

Tel./ Fax. 932 – 5209

GENERAL PHYSICS 1
Mr. Julius Edgar Reyes

DEFINITION OF FORCE

 A FORCE is a push or pull upon an object resulting from the object's interaction with another object.
Whenever there is an interaction between two objects, there is a force upon each of the objects.
When the interaction ceases, the two objects no longer experience the force. Forces only exist as a
result of an interaction.

CONTACT FORCE

 Contact forces are forces that act between two objects that are physically touching each other. A
Contact force as the name suggests acts on a point of an object by direct contact. Forces that act
between the objects are in contact with each other are called Contact Forces. These forces are
produced and experienced when a body comes in contact with another body. The Contact may be
Continuous or sometimes momentary. The former case is known as Continuous force and the latter
case is known as impulse force.

TYPES OF CONTACT FORCES

 APPLIED FORCE - Force which is applied to an object by another object. It is a Muscular Force,
happens by Pushing or Pulling an Object.
 FRICTIONAL FORCE - Friction force is the result of two surfaces being pressed together closely. This
causes intermolecular attractive forces between molecules of different surfaces resulting in friction.
The frictional forces depend upon the nature of the surfaces. The more rough the surface the more
the frictional force.
 AIR RESISTANCE FORCE - The Air resistance force acts upon objects as they travel through the air.
This force opposes the motion of the object in the air.
 SPRING FORCE - The Spring force is the force exerted by a compressed or stretched spring upon any
object which is attached to it. Here the magnitude of the spring force is directly proportional to the
amount of stretch or compression of the spring.
 TENSION FORCE - When a body is suspended by a string attached to a rigid support,the body,due
to its weight ,pulls the weight vertically downwards and the string in its stretched condition pulls
the body upwards by a force which balances the weight of the body.this force developed in the
string is called tension force.The tension force is transmitted through a string, rope or cable. The
tension force is directed along the length of the wire. This force pulls the objects equally on the
opposite ends of the wire.
  NORMAL FORCE - When a body is placed on a surface, the body exerts a force downwards, equal to
its weight, on the surface, but the body does not move(or fall) because the surface exerts
an equal and opposite force on the body normal to surface which is called the Normal reaction
Force. This is also called the support force. If an object is resting upon a table then the table is
exerting an upward force upon the object in order to support the weight of the object. If a person
leans against a wall, the wall pushes horizontally on the person.

 When a contact force acts between two objects, both objects experience the same size force, but in
opposite directions. This is Newton's Third Law of Motion.

NON - CONTACT FORCE

Non - Contact Force can be defined as, as stated below.

 Forces which come into play when two object do not have any physical contact between them.

 When a force is applied on some body by another object without any interaction or contact is called
non contact force.

 In a Non-contact force the force information is transmitted over distance.

TYPES OF NON - CONTACT FORCES

 GRAVITATIONAL FORCE - Gravitation or Gravity is a process by which bodies with a physical weight,
however, small it is, are attracted towards earth surface. They are attracted by a force which is
proportional to their weight.Gravitation is responsible for keeping all the planets in their respective
orbit around the sun and is the non contact force at its best.

 MAGNETIC FORCE - It is a property by virtue of which certain special substances

called 'magnets'• exert a special force on other magnets or substances made up of iron. This force is
called magnetic force which is a kind of non contact force as the materials just need to be in the
vicinity of the magnet.

 ELECTROSTATIC FORCE - Electrostatics is all about attraction and repulsion of charges and is another
type of non contact force. Some materials have special properties of developing charge on their
surface once they are rubbed like amber. These materials then attract opposite charges and hence
display the property of electrostatics.