Degrees of freedom (mechanics) has only one degree of freedom because the positions of the cars behind the engine are constrained by the shape of the track. An automobile with highly stiff suspension can be considered to be a rigid body traveling on a plane (a flat, two-dimensional space). This body has three independent degrees of freedom consisting of two components of translation and one angle of rotation. Skidding or drifting is a good example of an automobile's three independent degrees of freedom. The position and orientation of a rigid body in space is defined by three components of translation and three components of
Decimal degrees radius of the semi-major axis of the Earth at the equator is 6,378,137.0 meters resulting in a circumference of 40,075,161.2 meters. The equator is divided into 360 degrees of longitude, so each degree at the equator represents 111,319.9 meters or approximately 111.32 km. As one moves away from the equator towards a pole, however, one degree of longitude is multiplied by the cosine of the latitude, decreasing the distance, approaching zero at the pole. The number of decimal places required for a particular precision at the equator is: A value in decimal degrees to a precision of 4 decimal places