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91

You're talking about a device (in helicopters the tail fan imparting horizontal thrust) that counteracts the torque imparted on the main rotor (and therefore on the helicopter) by the surrounding air as the main rotor is dragged through the air. You propose instead to impart an opposite torque through a reaction wheel. That would indeed impart an opposite ...

53

What luck! Just yesterday I was thinking about this exact same phenomenon whilst watching the film 'The Imitation Game'; the title sequence contained a moving tank. When I was little, I used to observe this all the time; not in wheels however, but in caterpillar tracks: Notice how, when a segment of the track touches the ground, it just stays there, in ...

39

There is another nice way of seeing this mathematically. It is not too hard to show that in the body frame, there are two conserved quantities: the square of the angular momentum vector $$L^2 = L_1^2 + L_2^2 + L_3^2$$ and the rotational kinetic energy, which works out to be $$T = \frac{1}{2}\left( \frac{L_1^2}{I_1} + \frac{L_2^2}{I_2} + \frac{L_3^2}{I_3}... 35 You can always decompose a motion like this into two parts: (1) rolling without slipping and (2) slipping without rolling. What is slipping without rolling? It means the object moves uniformly in one direction along the surface, with no angular velocity about the object's own center of mass. For instance, a box that is pushed along the ground can easily ... 23 The rectangular prism is a rigid body. The equations of motion of a rigid body around its center of mass are given by: (Please, see for example: Marsden and Ratiu , (page 6).$$I_1\dot\Omega_1=(I_2-I_3)\Omega_2\Omega_3I_2\dot\Omega_2=(I_3-I_1)\Omega_3\Omega_1I_3\dot\Omega_3=(I_1-I_2)\Omega_1\Omega_2Where \Omega_1,_2,_3 are the angular ... 22 As Yashas Samaga said, it will not stop on a smooth, but frictional surface. It will stop however on an actual rough surface (as it does in reality – e.g. a steel marble rolling on a rough stone surface will come to a halt quite quickly, although drag / rolling friction is as low as on a smooth glass plate, where the marble would indeed roll very far). The ... 21 If the yoyo is spinning without winding the string, then it must be that the friction between the inner barrel and the string is insufficient to lead to winding. A flick of the wrist or some other movement can lead to an increase in the friction and the beginning of winding. Once winding begins frictional forces between the string and barrel increase ... 18 The instability inherent in the medium length axis or \prod_2  as shown above is discussed in detail in Marsden and Ratiu, which is where the image is from. The unstable homoclinic orbit that connect the two unstable points have intersting features. Not only are they interesting because of the chaotic solutions via the Poincare-Melnikov method that can ... 17 Assumptions made in this answer: By rough surface, you meant a flat surface which has friction. The cylinder/sphere/disc/etc. are ideal; they do not deform. This is my reasonable guess; I am aware of the terminology used in Indian high school textbooks and exams (I am from India too) but you should still edit your question and make it clear. When a ... 16 I like your description of this cool bit of unintuitive physics. I find the best balance of a to b to c to cost of the object involved is best for a (boxed) pack of playing cards. The mathematical explanation for this (see also Wikipedia) is that when considered in the principal axis frame (i.e. the frame of reference that rotates with the body and ... 14 The above answers are all good but i want to give another example which really helped me with understanding what does it mean that the point of contact has a velocity of zero. Think of the 'spinning circular object' not as a ball, but instead think of it as a star polygon with an infinite amount of edges, for the sake of the example a very large number will ... 14 There's an alternative to @MichaelSeifert method which uses angular momentum and moments of inertia: it is to deal with the vector \vec\omega directly as we are interested in the evolution of this vector. One can express the kinetic energy and length squared of \vec L as \begin{align} T&=\frac{1}{2}\left(I_1\omega_1^2+I_2\omega_2^2+I_3\omega_3^2\... 13 Here's a straightforward but somewhat computational way. There are two steps. (1) Show how to define the angular velocity vector in terms of rotation matrices. (2) Write a general rotation in terms of Euler angles. (3) Combine (1) and (2) to get an expression for the angular velocity vector in terms of Euler angles. Step 1. Recall that if \mathbf x(t) is ... 12 You've duplicated constraints because if any one particle is constrainined in all three dimensions with all the other particles this constrains all the particles. The number of constraints is 3(N - 1). To give an example, take three particles a, b and c. If a is fixed relative to b and is also fixed relative to c, then b and c are fixed relative to each ... 12 Proposition: Given an arbitrary rigid body (and wrt. to an arbitrary choice of pivotal point for the rigid body, and wrt. to an arbitrary choice of Cartesian coordinates x, y, and z), then the diagonal elements I_{xx}, I_{yy}, and I_{zz} of the inertia tensor satisfy the triangle inequality, I_{xx} +I_{yy} ~\geq~ I_{zz}, \qquad I_{yy} +I_{zz} ...

12

Consider a point $P$ on the surface of the wheel. If you look at the horizontal velocity of that point in the frame of reference of the wheel (axis stationary), then for a wheel of radius $r$ with angular velocity $\omega$ that point will have horizontal component of velocity $$v_h = r\omega\cos(\omega t)$$ The linear velocity of the wheel $v = \omega r$. ...

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Keep in mind that the screw axis does not have to pass through the body. For your example place the axis of rotation parallel to the x axis straight above the cylinder, then rotate the cylinder 180° about it. The result will be equivalent to 180° rotation about the x axis followed by a translation along the z axis by twice the distance from the x axis to the ...

12

In a scenario of pure rolling of a rigid wheel on a flat plane, you don't need any friction. Once the wheel is rolling, it will continue to do so, even if the friction coefficient becomes zero. If this were not the case, you'd be violating conservation of angular momentum. There is no force, no torque and therefore no work done. The more interesting case is ...

11

Its really a great question and let us go by simple definition. Defination: As per what wikepedia says: A yo-yo (also spelled yoyo) is a toy which in its simplest form is an object consisting of an axle connected to two disks, and a length of string looped around the axle, similar to a slender spool. Working: But what really makes it work? In ...

10

you wrote: "How can [the velocity of the contact point] be zero when it's in continuous motion?". However, you should keep in mind that motion is relative and therefore your question should be actually read as: "How can the velocity of the contact point be zero relative to the contact surface, when it's in continuous motion relative to its axis of rotation?"...

9

Each particle that makes up a mechanical system, can be located by three independent variables labelling a point in space. You can choose any particle in the rigid body to start with and move it any where you want, giving three independent variables needed to specify its location. Choosing a second particle, you choose another set of three independent ...

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I think a reasonable first approximation can be made like this: choose an arbitrary orientation for the die, and figure out, if the die were released in that orientation with its lowermost point resting on a surface, which side would it fall on? That can be easily calculated; you just draw a line going straight down from the center of mass, and whichever ...

9

You are making a major flaw here. The friction between the 2 blocks is not going to be $10N$. It is going to be something, but we will have to calculate it. Assume the friction force to be $f$ such that the acceleration for both the blocks is same. Now, equations for $m_2$ and $m_1$ separately are: $$F-f = m_2*a = 3a$$ $$f = m_1*a = 5a$$ Solving both ...

9

As far as the laws of physics are concerned, you could do it if every so often you use the stored angular momentum in the flywheel to quickly reverse the direction of the main rotor and then start building up angular momentum in the other direction. Disadvantages: Oh boy, where to start? You need symmetric, and thus probably less efficient, rotor blades, ...

8

I assume you know about rotation matrices, and so for a sequence rotations about Z-X-Z with angles $\phi$, $\theta$ and $\psi$ repsectively you have $$\vec{\omega} = \dot{\phi} \hat{z} + T_1 \left( \dot{\theta} \hat{x} + T_2 \left( \dot{\psi} \hat{z} \right) \right)$$ The logic here is apply a local spin of $\dot{\phi}$, $\dot{\theta}$ and $\dot{\psi}$ ...

7

If both the cylinder and the surface are perfectly rigid, then yes, it will roll forever, at least until it encounters a bump that its kinetic energy is not sufficient to overcome. But if the surface can deform, not all of the energy used to deform it will be returned to the cylinder. Some of it will propagate away from the point of contact in the form of ...

6

Every rigid body has 3 translational dof. In addition, there are 0, 2, or 3 rotational dof, depending on the geometry, giving a total of 3, 5, or 6 dof. A spherically symmetric rigid body has no rotational dof. A rigid body with rotational symmetry around an axis has 2 rotational dof, namely two angles for orienting the symmetry axis along a direction. ...

6

Building up from the ground is essentially impossible. One reason is stability, as John Rennie points out in his answer, but a far more fundamental reason* has to do with compressive strength. When a space elevator is completed, the cable is under a lot of tension. However, if you build up from the ground then while you're building it it's under compression ...

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