Wolfram Demonstrations Project

This pendulum consists of a rod of mass

and length

with an attached disk of mass

and radius

. At time

, an impulse

acts on the disk and causes the pendulum to be instantly set in motion. The pendulum is subject to the force of gravity

Developed from the teaching materials of Thomas Peacock and David Gossard for Course 2.003 in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at MIT.

The equation of motion is

The initial angular velocity is

Contributed by: Sarah Lichtblau

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Impulse Acting on a Pendulum