Finding the Components of a Force.
Sometimes it is necessary to resolve a force into two components in order to study its
pulling or pushing effect in two specific directions. For example. in
Fig. 2-8a. F is to be resolved into two components along the two
members. defined by the u and v axes. In order to determine the
magnitude of each component. a parallelogram is constructed first. by
drawing lines starting from the tip of F. one line parallel to u and the
other line parallel to v. These lines then intersect with the v and u axes.
forming a parallelogram. The force components Fu and Fv are then
established by simply joining the tail of F to the intersection points on
the u and v axes. Fig. 2-8b. This parallelogram can then be reduced to a
triangle. which represents the triangle rule. Fig. 2-8c. From this. the law of
sines can then be applied to determine the unknown magnitudes of the
components.