Rectilinear Motion

 

 

Rectilinear Motion

 

A rigid body has mass and size. It may translate and rotate. The motion of a rigid body can be very complex. For example, an airplane has 6 degrees of freedom (i.e. 3 translational DOF and 3 rotational DOF).

 

 

Particles have mass but negligible size and have only 3 translational degrees of freedom. We will start by looking at the simplest case: kinematics of particles with 1 DOF. This is called rectilinear motion.