How do you determine the acceleration of objects in a pulley system?

Answer by  lonewarrior556 (45)

If you just need a pretty close ball park answer you can assume all the pulleys are massless and the tension on the string is uniform and it does not stretch. After, determine the forces on each object in the pulley system and divide it by their mass and you'll have the object instant acceleration.

Answer by  squirrel1434 (63)

Make a free-body diagram for each object in the pulley system. Include tension and gravity forces. Write F=ma equations for each object, and solve the resulting system of equations.