I think this is an interesting question, to which I don't really know the answer to. (Also, not a homework question.)
Say you have an uncharged metal sphere constrained to move in the z-axis. There is a charged ring lying in the x-y plane centered at the origin. Two cases: 1) the diameter of the ring is larger than the sphere, so that the sphere can pass through the ring, and 2) the diameter of the ring is smaller than the sphere, so the sphere cannot pass through the ring but can touch it.
What are the equilibrium position(s) of the ball?
For case 1) it is obvious that the center, by symmetry, is an equilibrium point. But are there more? The complication arises because of the finite size of the sphere. As the sphere starts to pass through the ring, the charge of opposite sign to the ring is induced near the ring, but the angle is very shallow, so there is not much attractive force. On the other hand the induced charge of the same sign gets pushed to the far end of the sphere, which causes a strong repulsive force, so the sphere might get repelled as it enters the ring. I'm not sure whether this is correct though. It might very well turn out that there is only 1 equilibrium point...
So aside from solving the system exactly to find the equilibrium points, is there a way to argue how many there are, for the 2 cases, and where they are?
