Angular quantities and centripetal force in horizontal and vertical circles, then simple harmonic motion end to end — equations, graphs, energy, and forced oscillation and resonance.
Unit 1 carries 10 of the 50 physics marks; with eight chapters sharing them, this one averages a little over one (MEC publishes weights by unit, not by chapter). It is the longest chapter of the eight, because MEC has packed two separate topics into it — uniform circular motion and simple harmonic motion — and both are formula-rich and heavily numerical, so the return per hour is high.
The MEC scope line runs: Displacement, velocity, acceleration and centripetal force in horizontal and vertical circles; simple harmonic motion: period, frequency, displacement, amplitude, velocity, acceleration, restoring force and energy, with graphical treatment; concept of forced oscillations. The three headings below are its three points, in MEC's order.
Three ways it comes. Recall: the direction of centripetal acceleration, the period of a seconds pendulum, what resonance means. Understanding: why a car skids outwards on an unbanked bend, why the tension at the bottom of a vertical circle exceeds that at the top by 6mg, why the kinetic and potential energies in SHM vary at twice the frequency of the displacement, how the a–x graph identifies SHM. Application: a banking angle, the minimum speed at the top of a loop, a pendulum's period on the Moon, the speed of a particle at a stated displacement.
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See the plansPhysical Quantities, Vectors and Scalars: Units, Errors, Resultants
SI units and prefixes, precision against accuracy, significant-figure arithmetic, error combination, the dimensional formulae that get asked, and every vector law from the parallelogram to the river crossing.
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The three equations of motion, what every slope and area on a motion graph means, free-fall and relative-motion numericals, the full projectile set, and what air resistance does to all of it.
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Free-body reasoning from Newton's three laws, the equilibrium conditions and Lami's theorem, impulse and momentum conservation, work-energy and power, the collision formulae, and every friction case the paper sets.
Rotational Dynamics: Moment of Inertia, Torque and Rolling
The angular analogue of every linear quantity: moment of inertia of a uniform rod, radius of gyration, torque as Ialpha, rotational work and power, angular momentum conservation and the rolling energy split.