Throw a ball...will travel farther on hot day or cold day

[csx]

I said cold because air is more viscous on a hot day. Answer says air is less dense on hot day so it travels farther.

is there something wrong with my rationale?

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[IslandStyle808]

Viscous is another term for friction. So cold air would be more viscous or have more friction, because cold air is more clumped together. This will slowdown the ball. This is why you want to increase temperature of air, which will decrease its density (air will spread out more). Thus increasing the distance the ball will travel.

 

[sillyjoe]

How does that relate to the viscosity of gases being higher a higher temperatures?

 

[el_duderino]

Why would more viscous = travel further?

Ask yourself: does a ball travel farther when thrown through air or through water?

 

[sillyjoe]

Why would more viscous = travel further?

Ask yourself: does a ball travel farther when thrown through air or through water?

Isn't cold air less viscous?

 

[el_duderino]

Isn't cold air less viscous?

Is it really? I misread the OP apparently. That's interesting, I'll have to think about that.

But that said, I'd expect the density of the air to have more of an effect.

 

[csx]

According to TBR, in general, if you increase the temperature of a fluid, the viscosity decreases. However, viscosity of a gas would increase.

 

[IslandStyle808]

According to TBR, in general, if you increase the temperature of a fluid, the viscosity decreases. However, viscosity of a gas would increase.

http://chemwiki.ucdavis.edu/Physica...roperties_of_Matter/Bulk_Properties/Viscosity

Yeah I think I made a mistake with my understanding of viscosity. The link that I have given, answers your question "partially." There are more collisions going on in the gas, so this would increase the viscosity of gas.

I think maybe TBR is referring to the density being less with increasing temperature, and that more spread out gas particles leads to less friction with the air. This would help the ball travel farther. However, I can see your dilemma, because if the particles are interacting more with increasing temperature, then one would assume that the ball interacts with the molecules even more so (since they are bouncing around a lot). It seems to be a little more intuitive than TBR is making it out to be.