CLASSICAL MECHANICS I: PROBLEM SET I (Dimensional Analysis) Due: 10.30 AM, Wednesady, 17th August 2011 1.

A mass m hangs from a massless string of length l and swings back and forth in the plane of the paper. The acceleration due to gravity is g. What can you say about the frequency of the oscillations? 2. A spring-mass system lies on a horizontal table. The spring constant is k and the mass is m. The spring force is F (x) = kx, where x is the displacement from the equilibrium position. What can we say about the frequency of oscillations? 3. A satellite of mass m travels in a circular orbit just above the earths surface. What can you say about its speed? 4. Escape velocity is the velocity needed to refute the What goes up must come down principle. Show that the escape velocity from the earth is v = upto numerical factors.
2GME RE

5. A tube of mass M and length l is free to swing around a pivot at one end. A mass m is positioned inside the (frictionless) tube at this end. The tube is held horizontally and then released. Let be the fraction of the tube that the mass has traversed by the time the tube becomes vertical. Does depend on l? 6. How does the speed of waves in a uid depend on its density , and bulk modulus B (which has units of pressure, which is force per area)? 7. Consider a vibrating star, whose frequency depends, at most, on its radius R, mass density , and Newtons gravitational constant G. How does depend on R, , G? 8. A particle of mass m and initial speed V is subject to a velocity-dependent damping force of the form bv n . a) For n = 0, 1, 2, , determine how the stopping time depends on m, V and b. b) For n = 0, 1, 2, , determine how the stopping distance depends on m, V and b. Check if your answers make sense. 9. Draw the result of the following vector additions: a) Add a vector 2 cm east to one 3 cm northwest. b) Add a vector 8cm east to one 12 cm northwest. c) Compare the answers of the above two questions and frame a theorem about adding a pair of vectors that are multiples of another pair. 10. Given two vectors a = 3 + 4 5 and b = + 2 + 6, calculate by x y z x y z vector methods: a) The length of each. b) The scalar product a b. c) The included angle between them.

d) The direction cosines for each. e) The vector sum and dierence a b. f ) The vector product a b. 11. Given two vectors such that a + b = 11 y + 5 and a b = 5 + 11 + 9: x z x y z a) Find a and b. b) Find the angle included between a and a + b using vector methods. 12. The pilot of an aeroplane wishes to reach a point 200 miles east of his present position. A wind blows 30 miles/hr from the northwest. Calculate his vector velocity with respect to the moving air mass if his schedule requires him to arrive at his destination in 40 min. 13. Two particles are emitted from a common source and at a particular time have displacements r1 = 4 + 3 + 8 and 2 + 10 + 5. x y z x y z a) Sketch the positions of the particles and write the expression for the displacement r of particle 2 relative to particle 1. b) Use the scalar product to nd the magnitude of each vector. c) Calculate the angles between all possible pairs of the three vectors. d) Calculate the projection of r on r1 . e) Calculate the vector product r1 r2 . 14. Two particles 1 and 2 travel along the x and y axes with respective velocities v1 = 2 cm/sec and v2 = 3 cm/sec. At t = 0, they are at x1 = 3cm, x y y1 = 0, x2 = 0, and y2 = 3 cm. a) Find the vector r2 r1 that represents the position of 2 relative to 1, as a function of time. b) When and where are the two particles closest. 15. What is the angle between two intersecting body diagonals of a cube? A body diagonal connects two corners and passes through the interior of the cube. 16. Show that a b, if | a + b |=| a b |. 17. A parallelepiped has edges described by the vectors x + 2, 4, and y + 3 y y z from the origin. Find the volume. 18. Three forces F1 , F2 , F3 act simultaneously on a point particle. The resultant sum FR is simply the vector sum of forces. The particle is said to be in equilibrium if FR = 0. a) Show that if FR vanishes, the vectors representing three forces form a triangle. b) If FR = 0 as above, is it possible for any one of the vectors to lie outside the plane determined by the other two? c) A particle subject to a vertically downward force of 10 newtons and suspended from a cord (tension 15 newtons) making an angle of 0.1 rad from the vertical cannot be in equilibrium. What third force is required to produce equilibrium?

19. The constant forces F1 = x + 2 + 3 dynes and F2 = 4 5 2 dynes y z x y z act together on a particle during a displacement from the point A(20, 15, 0)cm to the point B(0, 0, 7)cm. a) What is the work done in ergs on the particle? The work done is given by F r where F is the resultant force and r is the displacement. b) Calculate separately the work done by F1 and F2 . c) Suppose the same forces were acting, but the displacement went from B to A. What is the work done on the particle in this case? 20. The torque or turning moment N of a force about a given point is given by r F , where r is the vector from the given point to the point of application of F . Consider a force F = 3 + y + 5 dynes acting at the point 7 + 3 + z x z x y cm. Remember that r F = -F r. a) What is the torque in dyn-cm about the origin? b) What is the torque about the point (0, 10, 0)?

MATHEMATICAL SUPPLEMENT I (Vector Algebra) Consider a rectangular cartesian set of coordinates relative to which the position of a point is (x, y, z) and imagine the axes rotated about the origin to a new orientation, the coordinates of the point with respect to this new set of axes being (x , y , z ). Once a rotation is specied, the relation between the two coordinates becomes known. For example a rotation about the z axis by is described by x = xcos + ysin y = ycos xsin z =z We can rewrite the above three equations in a condensed form as follows
3

xi =
j=1

Sij xj

where the matrix S is

cos S = sin 0

sin cos 0

0 0 1

Notation: The Greek capital sigma denotes an instruction to sum the quantity following the over the repeated index whose range is indicated above and below . In order to avoid cluttering our expressions, we establish the convention that summation is carried out over repeated indices. Thus everytime we nd a repeated index, it is implicit that we sum over the range of its values. If three quantities have values A1 , A2 , A3 when referred to (x, y, z) axes, and values A1 , A2 , A3 when referred to the (x , y , z ) coordinates, and if Ai = Sij Aj i.e., if they transform in the same way under a rotation of the axes as the coordinates xi do, then the three quantities represent a vector. The set of nine quantities that may be formed by taking the products in pairs of the components of two vectors Tij = Ai Bj is called an outer product of the vectors A and B. Such a set transforms according to the rule Tij = Ai Bj = Sik Sjl Tkl Any set of quantities Tij which transforms as above is called a second rank tensor, even if the quantities cannot be expressed as the outer product of two vectors.

A vector is a tensor of rank one. A scalar is a tensor of rank zero. Higher rank tensors can be constructed by generalising the example of a second rank tensor. A second rank tensor establishes a linear relationship between two rst rank tensors (vectors). A third rank tensor is required to establish a linear relationship between a vector and a second rank tensor and so on. The Kronecker delta and the Levi-Civita tensor, to be introduced below, are examples of a second rank tensor and a third rank tensor respectively. Denote a set of orthonormal basis vectors in three-dimensional space by e1 , e2 , e3 . The word basis means that a general vector A can be written as A = 3 A1 e1 + A2 e2 + A3 e3 = i=1 Ai ei . The orthonormality of the basis means ei ej = ij , where the Kronecker delta ij has the properties that it is equal to unity if i = j and 0 otherwise. If the elements 11 , 12 , are arranged in an array with the rst index denoting a row, and the second a column, it follows that ij are the elements of a unit 3 3 matrix. Using the summation convention introduced above, a scalar product A B is represented as follows:
3 3 3 3

AB =
i=1

Ai ei
j=1

Bj ej =
i,j=1

Ai Bj ei ej =
i=1

Ai Bi = Ai Bi

As another example, note that A(B C) = ei Ai Bj Cj . Note that the orthonormal vectors ei also satisfy the following triple products (products involving one scalar and one vector product) e1 (2 e3 ) = e3 (1 e2 ) = e2 (3 e1 ) = 1 e e e e1 (3 e2 ) = e2 (1 e3 ) = e3 (2 e1 ) = 1 e e e e1 (1 e3 ) = e1 (1 e2 ) = e2 (2 e1 ) = 0 e e e where the represent triple products which involve any of the ei s, more than once. These equations can be conveniently summarised by introducing a new symbol, the Levi Civita tensor ijk , dened by ijk = 1, depending on whether the indices ijk each ranging over 1,2,3, are a cyclic or anticyclic permutation of the order (123). More specically, (312) and (231) are cyclic permutations of (123) and (213) and (321) are anticylic permutations of (123). It is thus antisymmetric under the exchange of any two indices. It follows that it is identically equal to zero if it has a repeated index. In terms of the Levi-Civita tensor, the triple products in the last paragraph can be written in one line viz. ei (j ek ) = e
ijk ,

(i, j, k = 1, 2, 3)

The following two identities satised by the Levi-Civita tensor are easily veried: ikl imn = mk nl nk ml

ikl ikn

= 2nl =6

ikl ikl

The vector product of two vectors is given in terms of the Levi-Civita tensor by the expression (A B)i = ijk Aj Bk This is analogous to the expression for the scalar product in terms of the Kronecker delta viz. A B = ij Ai Bj Exercises: 1. Demonstrate the following vector identities: A (B C) = (A C)B (A B)C A (B C) = (A B) C (A B) (C D) = (A C)(B D) (A D)(B C) 2. The trace of a second rank tensor is the sum of all its diagonal elements. That is
3

TrT =
k=1

Tkk

Show that Tr T is invariant under rotations. 3. Show that the sum of squares of all elements of a second rank tensor is invariant under rotations. 4. If S and T are two second rank tensors, show that ij Sij Tij is an invariant under rotation.