Acceleration is normal plus tangential acceleration¶

The acceleration of a body moving arbitrarily is composed of two parts:

normal, or centripetal, acceleration, which is always present in a rotating environment and points to the instantaneous axis of rotation,
and tangential acceleration, which is responsible for the change in the magnitude of the velocity vector.

Links:

total_acceleration¶: Vector of the body’s total acceleration.

Symbol:: a
Latex:: \({\vec a}\)
Dimension:: acceleration

normal_acceleration¶: Vector of the body’s normal acceleration.

Symbol:: a_n
Latex:: \({\vec a}_\text{n}\)
Dimension:: acceleration

tangential_acceleration¶: Vector of the body’s tangential acceleration.

Symbol:: a_t
Latex:: \({\vec a}_\text{t}\)
Dimension:: acceleration

law¶

a = a_n + a_t

Latex:: \[{\vec a} = {\vec a}_\text{n} + {\vec a}_\text{t}\]