Which has the greater change in momentum, a 50 gram clay ball that strikes a wall at 1 m/s and sticks or a 50 gram superball that strikes the wall at 1 m/s and bounces away at 0.8 m/s. explain?

50 gram superball that strikes the wall at 1 m/s and bounces away at 0.8 m/s has greater change in kinetic energy.

Explanation:

50 gram superball that strikes the wall at 1 m/s and bounces away at 0.8 m/s has the greater change in kinetic energy because the collision is elastic in nature that is bodies separates after collision and doesn't lose any kinetic energy.

Also for an elastic collision, both the momentum and energy of the bodies are conserved compare to inelastic collision where only momentum is conserved but not the kinetic energy(this is attributed to bodies that sticks together after collision).

the velocity you are looking for is made up of two parts: horizontally velocity, vh, and its vertical velocity, vv. the actual velocity of the ball will be these two parts added together, and because velocity is a vector then they will need to be added vectorially.  

neglecting air resistance etc etc.,  

the horizontal velocity component will be constant (because there is no accelerating force in the horizontal direction.  

vh = 8 ms-1  

the vertical velocity component has an accelerating force: 'g'.  

using v = u +at where a = g = 9.81 ms-2.  

the vertical component of velocity, vv = 0 + gt = vv =9.81 x 2  

vv = 19.62 ms-1 . the zero appears because the virtical component of velocity at time t=0 is zero. remember, the ball was thrown horizontally.  

how fast it will be moving (it actual path (being a parabola )) will be the vector sum of these two.  

adding vectorally gives: -  

v = sqr root (8^2 + 19.62^2) = sqr root(64+384.9) = 21.18 or 21.2 ms-1

+15-35=-20

going in opposite directions