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Double SuspendedBifilar Pendulum

This document describes an experiment using a bifilar pendulum to determine the moment of inertia of a rod. A bifilar pendulum consists of a symmetric object like a uniform rod suspended from two parallel wires. The dynamics of the bifilar pendulum are governed by equations relating the time period of oscillation to the moment of inertia of the rod and the separation distance between the wires. The experiment involves measuring the time period of oscillations of the bifilar pendulum for different separation distances and using the relationship between time period and separation distance to calculate the moment of inertia from the slope of a graph of time period versus the inverse of separation distance.

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Zaeem Ul Islam
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329 views5 pages

Double SuspendedBifilar Pendulum

This document describes an experiment using a bifilar pendulum to determine the moment of inertia of a rod. A bifilar pendulum consists of a symmetric object like a uniform rod suspended from two parallel wires. The dynamics of the bifilar pendulum are governed by equations relating the time period of oscillation to the moment of inertia of the rod and the separation distance between the wires. The experiment involves measuring the time period of oscillations of the bifilar pendulum for different separation distances and using the relationship between time period and separation distance to calculate the moment of inertia from the slope of a graph of time period versus the inverse of separation distance.

Uploaded by

Zaeem Ul Islam
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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A Bifilar or a Doubly Suspended Pendulum

By

Dr Afshan Irshad

Department of Physics & Applied Mathematics

Pakistan Institute of Engineering & Applied Sciences


A Bifilar or Doubly Suspended Pendulum
Pendulums have been around for thousands of years. The ancient Chinese used the pendulum
principle to predict earthquakes. Galileo Galilei was the first European to work on pendulums
and discovered that their regularity could be used for keeping time, leading to the first clock. In
1656, the Dutch inventor and mathematician, Huygens successfully built an accurate clock based
on the pendulum. Pendulums are used to understand the relationship between gravitational forces
and the mass of objects, the changes in speed and direction of objects, as well as the distance
between objects.

Objectives

In this experiment, we will,

1. Review the equations that govern the dynamics of a doubly suspended pendulum,
2. Determine the moment of inertia of a rod by using bifilar pendulum.
3. Learn how to compare theoretical predictions with experimental observations, and will
calculate uncertainties in the results.

Introduction

A bifilar pendulum consists of a symmetric object (such as a uniform rod) suspended from two
parallel light weight wires (filars) each of length L. Let 2r be the separation between the filars.
The recommended length of each filar L should be longer than 2r, maybe 3 or 4 times. For a symmetric
object (like a uniform bar) bifilar pendulum is set into motion in and out of the page (the left end goes
into the page as the right end comes out of the page).
If the pendulum is twisted in the horizontal xy- plane, then there will be no acceleration
along the z-axis. The tension in each filar will be
T = (mg/2) x cos   (mg/2),
where  is a small angle in the vertical plane indicating the amount of twist in the vertical
direction. The twist in the horizontal xy- plane is measured as . It can be seen in Figure 1, that
L sin  = r sin. The displacement in the horizontal plane is described by d. So, for small
displacements
tan    = d / r

Figure 1: (a) The bifilar pendulum. The angle  is in the horizontal xy-plane while  is in the
vertical plane. The rod with black ends shows the untwisted and the rod with white ends shows
the twisted position. (b) Filar suspension geometry.

When the twisted pendulum is released, it will revert to its equilibrium position. The horizontal
component of the tension in each filar, with a moment arm r about the axis of rotation will
provide the restoring torque as shown by a thick arrow in Figure (1b). Since the restoring torque
on both ends of the rod additively combines to create an oscillation in the same direction, so, the
total torque acting on the suspended rod can be written as,

( ) (1)

As the motion is in xy-plan, so, angle  can be converted into angle  to simplify the problem by
using the vertical and the horizontal triangles shown in Figure (1b). The vertical triangle shows
(2)
where L/ is the twisted length and since L is small, L/  L. The horizontal triangle shows,
d = r tan  r sin  r  (3)
by comparing Equations (2) and (3) one can obtain,

( )

 ( ) ( ) (4)

According to the Newton's second law for angular motion,

( ) (5)

where I is the moment of inertia and  is the angular acceleration. By comparing Equation (1)
and (2) one can write the angular equation of motion of the doubly suspended pendulum.
Comparison of equation (4) & (5) gives

( ) ( ) (6)

This equation is very much similar to the equation of simple harmonic motion of a simple
pendulum, which can be written as

( ) ( ) (7)

Now the time period of the bifilar pendulum can be written in the same way as that of simple
pendulum by considering equation (6).

√ (8)

Experimental Procedure:

Figure 2: The experimental setup for a bifilar


pendulum.
1. Measure the weight and length of the object of the rod. Disturb the equilibrium position
of the rod by a gentle push in a way that the rod twists about the center of mass.
2. Measure the time period of the twisting rod for ten oscillations, by using stop watch.
What is the uncertainty in T?
3. Take 5 readings for each r and take average.
4. Plot T vs 1/r. What type of trend you see.
5. From the graph, find the moment of inertia of the rod and its uncertainty.

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