The pitch of the whistle of an engine appears to drop by $20 \%$ of original value when it passes a…

The pitch of the whistle of an engine appears to drop by $20 \%$ of original value when it passes a stationary observer. If speed of sound in air $350 \mathrm{~m} / \mathrm{s}$, then speed of engine in $\mathrm{m} / \mathrm{s}$ is
  1. $1050$
  2. $175$
  3. $520.5$
  4. $87.5$

Solution

Aparent pitch heard by the observer $\mathrm{f}^{\prime}=\frac{4}{5} \mathrm{f}$ where, $f$ is the original pitch of the engine. As the apparent frequency is lowered, thus the engine must be moving away from the stationary observer. From Doppler effect, apparent frequency heard: $\begin{aligned} & \mathrm{f}^{\prime}=\mathrm{f}\left[\frac{\mathrm{V}_{\text {sound }}}{\mathrm{V}_{\text {sound }}+\mathrm{V}_{\text {source }}}\right] \\ & \therefore \frac{4 \mathrm{f}}{5}=\left[\frac{350}{350+\mathrm{V}_{\text {Source }}}\right] \\ & \Rightarrow \mathrm{V}_{\text {Source }}=87.5\end{aligned}$ /

Asked in: MHT CET 2022 (05 Aug Shift 2)

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