I am doing a little physics project with circle circle collisions for now, and have tried to do impulse resolution for collisions with 2 circles, using the following code. 

relativeVelocity = (other.doVerletVelocity()).subtract(self.doVerletVelocity())
normDirecVel = relativeVelocity.dotProduct(collisionNormal)

restitution = -1 - min(self.restitution, other.restitution)

numerator = normDirecVel * restitution

impulseScalar = numerator / float(1 / self.mass) + float(1 / other.mass)

selfVel = self.doVerletVelocity()
otherVel = other.doVerletVelocity()

impulse = collisionNormal.scalarMult(impulseScalar)

selfDV = impulse.scalarMult(1 / self.mass)
otherDV = impulse.scalarMult(1 / other.mass)

newSelfVel = selfVel.subtract(selfDV)
newOtherVel = otherVel.add(otherDV)

self.oldPos = (self.center).subtract(newSelfVel.scalarMult(dt))
other.oldPos = (other.center).subtract(newOtherVel.scalarMult(dt))

The problem seems to be that whatever value I give to self.mass and other.mass, the output stays exactly the same, the values that I used are:

center = Vector(0, 0)
radius = 1
oldPos = Vector(0, 0)
accel = Vector(0, 0)
mass = 100
restitution = 0.001

center2 = Vector(0, 3.20)
radius2 = 1
oldPos2 = Vector(0, 3.201)
accel2 = Vector(0, -1)
mass2 = 1
restitution2 = 1

the output was:

0.0      0.0      0.0      2.165000000000114
0.0      0.0      0.0      2.1360000000001174
0.0      0.0      0.0      2.1066000000001206
0.0      0.0      0.0      2.076800000000124
0.0      0.0      0.0      2.046600000000127
0.0      0.0      0.0      2.0160000000001306
0.0      0.0      0.0      1.985000000000134
CIRCLE INTERSECTION
0.0      -1.985000000000134      0.0      3.938600000000271
0.0      -3.970000000000268      0.0      5.891800000000408
0.0      -5.9550000000004015      0.0      7.844600000000544
0.0      -7.940000000000535      0.0      9.797000000000681

I changed the values for the masses to make them higher, bu the output still remained the same, if you could get to the bottom of this, it would be much appreciated.

I noticed this:

impulseScalar = numerator / float(1 / self.mass) + float(1 / other.mass)

You are missing parentheses:

impulseScalar = numerator / ( float(1 / self.mass) + float(1 / other.mass) )

Dirk Gregorius, That does not have an effect on the values outputted by the method.

23 hours ago, Dirk Gregorius said:

I noticed this:

impulseScalar = numerator / float(1 / self.mass) + float(1 / other.mass)

You are missing parentheses:

impulseScalar = numerator / ( float(1 / self.mass) + float(1 / other.mass) )

 

I tried that, yet it has no effect on the values. When displaying the circles on the screen, using pygame module, it showed that after colliding, the circles moved in opposite directions, but with velocities faster than what they collided with.

Doesn't that appear strange to you? Obviously it should have an effect since :

n/a + b != n / (a + b) for any b != 0

1 minute ago, Dirk Gregorius said:

Doesn't that appear strange to you? Obviously it should have an effect since :

n/a + b != n / (a + b) for any b != 0

It definitely is strange, yet what I described is the case. I think the error might be in the way that 1/mass is calculated because changing the mass when defining the particle object has not bearing on the resultant impulse.

What language are you programming in? It might be that it is the type promotion. Try 

float(1.0f / self.mass)

Either way, this should be easy to find. Simply debug and step through the code.

17 minutes ago, Dirk Gregorius said:

What language are you programming in? It might be that it is the type promotion. Try 

float(1.0f / self.mass)

 

Either way, this should be easy to find. Simply debug and step through the code.

 

Are you supposed to deal with penetration in the collision detection phase, or the impulse resolution phase? I ask this because that might be what is throwing this off, because as soon as they collide, the circles make a large jump, which might be affecting their velocities as i am just approximating velocity as current position - old position divided by the timestep, since my velocity verlet implementation does not deal with veloicty explicitly.

You detect penetration in the collision phase. You can deal with it in the impulse phase or in a separate penetration recovery phase.

Just now, Dirk Gregorius said:

You detect penetration in the collision phase. You can deal with it in the impulse phase or in a separate penetration recovery phase.

 

Thanks, I think that is what is causing the value of the velocities to be large after impulse resolution.