How Do Different Surfaces Affect How High A Basketball Bounces

964 Words4 Pages

Have you ever tried to dribble a basketball on carpet or dirt. If so, you could probably tell it was a lot different than when you dribble a ball on a nice smooth wooden gym floor. It was probably much harder to do it on the dirt than on the wood. What surface is the best for making a basketball bounce? What surface would make a ball bounce higher? Well you can find out by reading the rest of this paper.

“Where does a basketball bounce best.”Why do different surfaces affect how high a basketball bounces? Different surfaces affect how high a basketball bounces because different types of surfaces absorb more energy than others. For example concrete is going to absorb a lot less energy than carpet because it is a harder surface and harder …show more content…

Yes height does affect how high a basketball will bounce. For example if you drop a basketball from 4 feet it will bounce higher than if you bounce it from 1 foot. This happens because of acceleration. When you bounce a ball from somewhere high it gets more acceleration and speed and therefore makes it bounce higher than if it was from a lower height. This is because as the ball is falling it is picking up speed which gives it more kinetic energy. When the ball hits the ground its kinetic energy is turned into elastic energy this makes the ball flatten out. Then that elastic energy is converted right back into kinetic energy when it goes up. So the more kinetic energy a ball gets when it is dropped the more energy it will have when it hits the ground which will give it more energy when it is headed back up therefore making it bounce higher.

“Does the Mass of a Ball affect its bounce.” Yes mass does affect how high a ball will bounce. It does because the more mass a ball has the more kinetic energy it gets due to gravity. When the ball hits the ground its kinetic energy is turned into elastic energy and the more kinetic energy there is the when the ball is bounced the more kinetic energy it will have going back up. That is how mass makes a ball bounce