Calculators

Converters

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Convert units of acceleration by entering the value to convert and the from and to units.

How to Convert Units of Acceleration

Conversions are performed by using a conversion factor. By knowing the conversion factor, converting between units can become a simple multiplication problem:

S * C = E

Where S is our starting value, C is our conversion factor, and E is our end converted result.

To simply convert from any unit into meter per second squared, m/s², for example, from foot per minute per second, 50 ft/(min·s), just multiply by the conversion value in the right column in the table below.

50 ft/(min·s) * 0.00508 [ (m/s²) / (ft/(min·s)) ] = 0.254 m/s²

To convert from m/s² into units in the left column divide by the value in the right column or, multiply by the reciprocal, 1/x.

0.254 m/s² / 0.00508 [ (m/s²) / (ft/(min·s)) ] = 50 ft/(min·s)

To convert among any units in the left column, say from A to B, you can multiply by the factor for A to convert A into m/s² then divide by the factor for B to convert out of m/s².  Or, you can find the single factor you need by dividing the A factor by the B factor.

For example, to convert from foot per minute per second, ft/(min·s), to mile per hour per second, mi/(h·s), you would multiply by 0.00508 then divide by 0.44704.  Or, multiply by 0.00508/0.44704 = 0.01136364. So, to convert directly from ft/(min·s) to mi/(h·s) you multiply by 0.01136364.

To understand how to also convert the units follow this example. Say you want to convert from ft/(min·s) to m/s²; you want to convert the foot to meter and the minute to second.  Since you can multiply anything by 1 and still retain the original value, but in different units, set it up so that ft and min will cancel out leaving you with m/s/s or m/(s·s) or m/s².

Since:
1 m = 3.28084 ft, 1 m / 3.28084 ft = 1
1 min = 60 s, 1 min / 60 s = 1

We can write the conversion as:
1 ft/(min·s) = 1 ft/(min·s) * (1 m / 3.28084 ft) * (1 min / 60 s) = 0.00508 m/s²

And we now have our factor for conversion from ft/(min·s) to m/s² since 1 * 0.00508 = 0.00508.

Knowing that 1 ft/(min·s) = 0.00508 m/s² we can now find the conversion factor for converting back. Dividing both sides of the equation by 0.00508 we get about 196.8504 ft/(min·s) = 1 m/s².  So, the conversion factor to multiply by to convert from m/s² to ft/(min·s) is about 196.8504.

References/ Further Reading

The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) - The NIST Guide for the use of the International System of Units - Appendix B, subsections B.8 Factors for Units Listed Alphabetically and B.9 Factors for units listed by kind of quantity or field of science.

Lide, David R., Daniel (Editor-in-Chief). CRC Handbook of Chemistry and Physics, 89th Edition New York, NY: CRC Press, p. 1-28, 2008.

Wikipedia contributors. "Conversion of units" Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, last visited 26 Jun. 2011.