Originally posted by joe shmo
Your right, with the effects of relativity c is the actual limiting velocity. I think he just wanted to see if there existed a limiting velocity that would occurr in the practical realm of velocity( actually I don't know much about physics either, you probably no more 🙂).
However, throw in some air resistance there is probably a limiting velocity.
I'm not all too sure about this, this is outside the courses I followed 🙂
Here's my input.
A power of 1 Watt mean that 1J of energy is converted per second.
Since the source of the energy is not specified I'll assume it's some sort of engine.
Per second the kinetic energy 0.5*1*v^2 will increase by 1 J
Assuming v(0) = 0 we have K(t) = t, or mv^2 = 2t, or v^2 = 2t/m
This gives us a formula for the speed: v = sqrt(2t).
Therefore there is no maximm speed, aside for relativistic effects.
-------------------------------------------------
Should the mass itself be converted into energy then we have:
E = 1*c^2
We calculate the Kinetic energy at the point that the last bit of mass is converted:
K = 0,5 * 1 * v^2 = 1*c^2 ---> v = c*sqrt(2)
If somehow the energflow is capped when the mass reaches speed c we have
1*c^2 - 0,5*1*c^2 = 0,5*c^2 joules of energy left, wich corresponds to
m = E/c^2 = 0,5 kg
All this seems a bit odd, but then again a contant energyconvertion means a constant increase of kinetic energy.