REVIEW OF MATHEMATICS,

SCALARS, AND VECTORS

Engr. Kris Knowell Nugao, ChE
Course Facilitator
ENGGPHYS - Physics for Engineers
Learning Outcomes
• In this chapter, the students will review on:
• Algebra
• Geometry and trigonometry
• Differential calculus
• Integral calculus
• In this chapter, the students will learn:
• Scalars and vectors
• Vector addition
• Unit vectors and operations

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Review of Mathematics
• Algebra
Exercises:
1
1) 3 =
1+𝑥
2) 𝑎𝑥 + 2 = 𝑏𝑥 − 6
3) factoring
𝑎𝑥 + 𝑏𝑥 + 𝑐𝑥 = ?
𝑥 2 + 2𝑥𝑦 + 𝑦 2 = ?
𝑥2 − 𝑦2 = ?
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Review of Mathematics
• Geometry and trigonometry
Exercises:
1) Area of a triangle
2) Circumference of a circle in terms of radius
3) Surface area of a cylinder

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Review of Mathematics
• Geometry and trigonometry

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Review of Mathematics
• Geometry and trigonometry

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Review of Mathematics
• Geometry and trigonometry
• Pythagorean theorem
𝑎2 + 𝑏2 = 𝑐 2
𝑜𝑝𝑝
sin 𝜃 =
ℎ𝑦𝑝
𝑎𝑑𝑗
cos 𝜃 =
ℎ𝑦𝑝
𝑜𝑝𝑝
tan 𝜃 =
𝑎𝑑𝑗

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Review of Mathematics
• Geometry and trigonometry

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Review of Mathematics
• Differential calculus:
𝑑
1) 𝑘 =0
𝑑𝑥
𝑑
2) 𝑘𝑥 = 𝑘
𝑑𝑥
𝑑 𝑑𝑢 𝑑𝑣
3) 𝑢+𝑣 = +
𝑑𝑥 𝑑𝑥 𝑑𝑥
𝑑
4) 𝑥𝑛 = 𝑛𝑥 𝑛−1
𝑑𝑥

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Review of Mathematics
• Integral calculus:
𝑥 𝑛+1
1) ‫׬‬ 𝑥 𝑛 𝑑𝑥 = +𝐶 (only if 𝑛 ≠ 1)
𝑛+1
2) ‫ 𝑥𝑑 ׬ 𝑘 = 𝑥𝑑𝑘 ׬‬+ 𝐶
3) ‫ 𝑢 ׬‬+ 𝑣 𝑑𝑥 = ‫ 𝑥𝑑𝑢 ׬‬+ ‫ 𝑥𝑑𝑣 ׬‬+ 𝐶

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Scalars and Vectors
• Scalar = physical quantity with magnitude and no direction
• Vector = physical quantity with magnitude and direction

A car moving eastward at a velocity of 50 mph

Weight of a 10 books = 15 kg

A storm moving at 50 kph 30° northeast

Temperature = 323.5 K
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Scalars and Vectors
• Idealized models
• To simplify the analysis of
a) a baseball in flight, we use
b) an idealized model.

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Scalars and Vectors
• Drawing vectors:
• Draw a vector as a line with an arrowhead at its tip.
• The length of the line shows the vector’s magnitude.
• The direction of the line shows the vector’s direction.

NOTE: Practice drawing vectors in scale.

Example:
1) 100 kph 30° N of E, 50 kph SW, 50 kph east, 40 kph 50° S of W
2) 500 kN SE, 200 kN 40° E of N, 500 kN 60° W of S

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Scalars and Vectors
• Adding Two Vectors
• Head-to-tail method

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Scalars and Vectors
• The vectors can be added in any order.

Exercise: Add the following vectors and find the resultant vector.
1) 50 N SE, 100 N SE
2) 50 ft ∙ lbf NW, 30 ft ∙ lbf SE
3) 100 kph 30° N of E, 50 kph SW
4) 500 kN SE, 200 kN 40° E of N, 500 kN 60° W of S
5) A cross-country skier skis 1.00 km north and then 2.00 km east on a
horizontal snowfield. How far and in what direction is she from the
starting point?

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Scalars and Vectors
Give it a try!: Two displacement vectors, X and Y, have magnitude of 3.0
m and 4.0 m, respectively. Calculate the resultant vectors if:
(a) Vector X and Y are both due east;
(b) Vector X is due east and Vector Y is due west.

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Components of a vector
• Breaking the components of a vector
Example:
1) What are the 𝑥- and 𝑦-components of
vector 𝐷 in the figure shown? The
magnitude of the vector is 𝐷 = 3.00 𝑚,
and the angle 𝛼 = 45°.

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Components of a vector
• Breaking the components of a vector
Example:
2) What are the 𝑥- and 𝑦-components
of vector 𝐸 in the figure shown? Vector
E has a magnitude of 4.50 m, and angle
𝛽 is 37°.

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Components of a vector
• Finding the resultant vector
Example:
3) Determine the magnitude and direction of the resultant vector with
𝑥 − and 𝑦 − components 𝑅𝑥 = 4.50 𝑚 and 𝑅𝑦 = 5.75 𝑚.

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Components of a vector
• Finding the resultant vector
Example:
4) Solve for the resultant displacement of a student with the
following component displacements: 𝐴Ԧ = 210 𝑚, 52°𝑁 𝑜𝑓 𝐸 and
𝐵 = 150 𝑚, 23° 𝑊 𝑜𝑓 𝑁.

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Components of a vector
• Finding the resultant vector
Example:
5) Three players on a reality TV show are brought to the center of a large, flat
field. Each is given a meter stick, a compass, a calculator, a shovel, and (in a
different order for each contestant) the following three displacements:
𝐴Ԧ = 72.4 𝑚, 32 ° 𝑒𝑎𝑠𝑡 𝑜𝑓 𝑛𝑜𝑟𝑡ℎ
𝐵 = 57.3 𝑚, 36 ° 𝑠𝑜𝑢𝑡ℎ 𝑜𝑓 𝑤𝑒𝑠𝑡
𝐶Ԧ = 17.8 𝑚 𝑑𝑢𝑒 𝑠𝑜𝑢𝑡ℎ
The three displacements lead to the point in the field where the keys to the
prized treasure chest is buried. What is the magnitude and direction of the
resultant vector nearest to the buried keys?
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Unit vectors
• Unit vectors = describe direction; does not use angles and does not
use the conventional directions north, east, west and south

Consider the figure:

• 𝐴Ԧ has component vectors
𝐴𝑥 and 𝐴𝑦
• 𝑖Ƹ is in the 𝑥 − direction,
while 𝑗Ƹ is in the 𝑦 −
direction

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Unit vectors
• If a vector lies in an 𝑥𝑦𝑧 − plane, then the 𝑧 − plane can take the unit
vector direction of 𝑘.෠
• Vectors can be expressed as follows:
𝐴Ԧ = 𝐴𝑥 𝑖Ƹ + 𝐴𝑦 𝑗Ƹ + 𝐴𝑧 𝑘෠
𝐵 = 𝐵𝑥 𝑖Ƹ + 𝐵𝑦 𝑗Ƹ + 𝐵𝑧 𝑘෠
• Resultant vector of above component vectors will be:
𝑅 = (𝐴𝑥 +𝐵𝑥 )𝑖Ƹ + (𝐴𝑦 + 𝐵𝑦 )𝑗Ƹ + (𝐴𝑧 + 𝐵𝑧 )𝑘෠

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Unit vectors
Example:
Given the two displacements: 𝐷 = 6.00𝑖Ƹ + 3.00𝑗Ƹ − 1.00𝑘෠ 𝑚 and
𝐸 = 4.00𝑖Ƹ − 5.00𝑗Ƹ + 8.00𝑘෠ 𝑚 , calculate the magnitude of the
displacement 𝐹Ԧ = 2𝐷 − 𝐸.

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Unit vectors
Example:
Consider two vectors:
𝐴Ԧ = 4𝑚 𝑖Ƹ + 8𝑚 𝑗Ƹ − 13𝑚 𝑘෠
𝐵 = 3𝑚 𝑖Ƹ + 7𝑚 𝑗Ƹ − 9𝑚 𝑘෠
What is: (a) 𝐴Ԧ + 𝐵 in unit vectors; (b) 𝐴Ԧ − 𝐵 in unit vectors;
(c) magnitude of 𝐴Ԧ + 𝐵

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Unit vectors
Example:
In the anime series One Piece,
Monkey D. Luffy arrived at
Onigashima Island in his quest to
kick Kaido’s face. The route he
took was from a place called
UDON and stopped over in HAPU
PORT as shown in the figure.
Using unit vectors, determine the
shortest distance between UDON
and ONIGASHIMA.
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Reference
Books:
Young, H.D. & Freedman, R.A. (2020). University physics with modern
physics. 15th edition. Addison-Wesley (Pearson).

Karaoglu, Bekir. (2020). Classical physics. Springer Nature Switzerland

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