What would become of the earth's orbit (which you may consider to be a circle) if half of the sun's mass were suddenly to disappear? would the earth remain bound to the sun? [hints: consider what happens to the earth's ke and pe at the moment of the great disappearance. the virial theorem for the circular orbit (problem 4.41) with this one.] treat the sun (or what remains of it) as fixed.

Since you have not included the experiment situation and the data, of course, i can not give you specific details about it. but i can you with this question.1) i will assume that the motion is projectile (parabolic) motion.2) yes, the horizontal distance depends on the horizontal velocity as, naming vx the horizontal velocity and t the time, it is: x = vx × t3) now, observe that the flight time depends on the vertical velocity as, naming voy the initial vertical velocity, t the time and y the vertical distance before reaching the ground: y = yo + voy×t - gt² / 2.the higher the initial vertical velocity (voy) the longer the object will be flying and so t will be higher in the equation for the horizontal distance.that explains the relationship between the horizontal distance and the horizontal velocity.