(a) This part does not need a lot of explanation I feel. We know that the wheel is moving at a constant velocity in the linear direction, thus there is no acceleration due to this motion. The point
A however is moving in a circle, thus it will be undergoing the centripetal acceleration given by
.Nevertheless a completely mathematical treatment is possible and I shall provide it. It will also better explain the origin of centripetal acceleration. The position vector of a any point on the rim can be expressed as,
(b) The distance traversed by the wheel rim is given by,

. As seen in the figure, when the rim point is at an angle

, the magnitude of the net velocity vector (
AB in the figure), using basic trigonometry, is given by,

Thus, the distance traveled by the rim of the wheel between two points of contact is given by,
No comments:
Post a Comment