Why amplitude does not affect the period of a pendulum

You did not say what was oscillating. I will answer for the case where it is a simple pendulum that is oscillating.

If it is a pendulum, amplitude must be small because the "time period does not depend on amplitude" rule applies to pendulums only if it is exhibiting simple harmonic motion. Simple harmonic motion of a physical system requires that the force restoring the object bob to the equilibrium position must be proportional to the displacement from the equilibrium position. This equation comes from valid application of trigonometry.

You know that sine is not a linear relation to the angle. It plots a sine wave. Note that a vibration can be a single or multiple event, whereas oscillations are usually repetitive for a significant number of cycles. Begin typing your search term above and press enter to search.

Press ESC to cancel. Skip to content Home Social studies How does amplitude affect period of a pendulum? Social studies. Ben Davis August 9, How does amplitude affect period of a pendulum? Does the period of a pendulum depend on the amplitude? Does amplitude affect period? How is time period related to amplitude? Which pendulum will swing faster? What is amplitude of a pendulum?

What affects amplitude of a pendulum? What is the symbol of amplitude? What is amplitude affected by? What is amplitude with diagram? What is amplitude and frequency? Is frequency directly proportional to amplitude? What happens to energy when amplitude increases? What is amplitude frequency and time period? When amplitude increases what happens to time period? Gravity is the force behind the fall of rain, the power of rivers, the pulse of tides; it pulls the matter of planets and stars toward their centers to form spheres, holds planets in orbit, and gathers cosmic dust together to form stars.

Gravitational forces are thought of as involving a gravitational field that affects space around any mass. The strength of the field around an object is proportional to its mass and diminishes with distance from its center.

For example, the earth's pull on an individual will depend on whether the person is, say, on the beach or far out in space. The image of an astronaut floating in space illustrates this point. Students should already know that the earth's gravity pulls any object toward it without touching it.

Benchmarks for Science Literacy , p. The relationship between force and motion can be developed more fully now and the difficult idea of inertia can be given attention. The difficult notion is that an object in motion will continue to move unabated unless acted on by a force. To students, the things around them do appear to slow down of their own accord unless constantly pushed or pulled.

The more experiences students can have in seeing the effect of reducing friction, the easier it may be to get them to imagine the friction-equals-zero case. Galileo Galilei was one scientist who studied gravitational forces. In the late s, Galileo began to study the behavior of falling bodies, using pendulums extensively in his experiments to research the characteristics of motion.

At the time, virtually all scholars still followed the belief of Aristotle that the rate of fall was proportional to the weight of the body.

Galileo showed that this conclusion was erroneous based on the fact that air resistance slowed the fall of light objects. Galileo was able to combine observation, experiment, and theory to prove his hypotheses.

In easily verifiable experiments or demonstrations it can be shown that the period swing of a pendulum is independent of the pendulum's mass. It depends instead on the length of the pendulum. This would suggest that objects fall at a rate independent of mass. The greater the amount of the unbalanced force, the more rapidly a given object's speed or direction of motion changes; the more massive an object is, the less rapidly its speed or direction changes in response to any given force.

In this lesson, students will explore websites with simulations of pendulums, where they'll be able to change the length and angle of the bob and observe its effects.

They will then construct and test their own controlled-falling systems, or pendulums, to further observe and verify these theories. Ask students the following questions in order to get a feel for their current knowledge and perceptions of pendulums. Answers to these questions are provided for you, but don't expect or lead students to these answers yet.

At this point, simply gather and keep a good record of students' current ideas; students will have a chance to refine these after the website exploration that follows. Many students believe that changing any of the variables string length, mass, or where we release the pendulum will change the frequency of the pendulum. Give them a chance to debate and discuss their answers before continuing. After students have explored these sites, review with them their list of answers to the initial questions about pendulums, revising it with the current information based on the students' exploration of the websites.

As you review their answers to the question, "What variables affect the rate of a pendulum's swing? Begin this part of the lesson by telling students that they will explore websites to learn more about how pendulums help us learn about gravitational forces. In the second part of the lesson, students will work in groups to construct their own pendulums and test what they have observed on the websites.

Have students run the demonstration called the Pendulum Lab. Click to run the simulation. Suppose you move from one city to another where the acceleration due to gravity is slightly greater, taking your pendulum clock with you, will you have to lengthen or shorten the pendulum to keep the correct time, other factors remaining constant?

Explain your answer. What is the length of a pendulum that has a period of 0. Some people think a pendulum with a period of 1. True or not, what is the length of such a pendulum? What is the period of a 1.

How long does it take a child on a swing to complete one swing if her center of gravity is 4. The pendulum on a cuckoo clock is 5. What is its frequency? Two parakeets sit on a swing with their combined center of mass At what frequency do they swing? What is its new period? A pendulum with a period of 2.

What is the acceleration due to gravity at its new location? At what rate will a pendulum clock run on the Moon, where the acceleration due to gravity is 1.

What time will it read Note that there are two answers, and perform the calculation to four-digit precision.