Three-dimensional kinematics of rigid bodies

Hiroki Okubo

Introduction

The acceleration of A is given by the time derivative

Eq. (4).

Although a large percentage of dynamics problems

a=
r + ( r)
(5)
in engineering can be solved by the principles of
plane motion, modern developments have focused
increasing attention on problems which call for the
analysis of motion in three dimensions. The intro- 4
Rotation about a fixed point
duction of a third dimension adds the possibility of
two additional components for vectors represent- When a body rotates about a fixed point, the
ing angular quantities including moments of forces, angular-velocity vector no longer remains fixed in
angular velocity, angular acceleration, and angular direction.
momentum.

4.1

Translation

We consider Infinitesimal rotations d 1 and d 2 of

a rigid body about the respective axes through the
fixed point O. As a result of d 1 , point A has a
displacement d 1 r, and d 2 causes a displacement d 2 r of point A. Either order of addition of these infinitesimal displacements clearly
produces the same resultant displacement, which is
d 1 r + d 2 r = (d 1 + d 2 ) r. Thus, the
two rotations are equivalent to the single rotation
d = d 1 + d 2 . It follows that the angular velocities 1 = 1 and 2 = 2 may be added to give
= = 1 + 2 .

Any two points in the body, such as A and B, will

move along parallel straight lines if the motion is
one of rectilinear translation or curvilinear translation. In either case, every line in the body, such as
AB, remains parallel to its original position.
The position vectors and their first and second
time derivatives are
rA

= r B + r A/B

(1)

vA
aA

= vB
= aB

(2)
(3)

Rotation and proper vectors

where r A/B remains constant.

4.2

Angular acceleration

Fixed-axis rotation

The angular acceleration of a rigid body in threedimensional motion is the time derivative of its anWe consider the rotation of a rigid body about a gular velocity, = .

fixed axis n-n in space with an angular velocity .

When the magnitude of remains constant, the
For fixed-axis rotation, does not change its direcangular acceleration is normal to . If we let
tion. We choose the origin O of the fixed coordinate
stand for the angular velocity with which the vector
system on the rotation axis. Any point such as A
itself rotates (precesses), the angular acceleration
which is not on the axis moves in a circular arc in
may be written
the plane normal to the axis and has a velocity
v =r

(4)
1

(6)

(d) The acceleration of A is

a

References

=30
O

[1] J. L. Meriam and L. G. Kraige, (2001), Engineering Mechanics, Volume 2, Dynamics, 5th
edition, Wiley

x
Figure 1: Rotating arm

Example

The 0.8-m arm OA is pivoted about the horizontal x-axis, and the entire assembly rotates about
the z-axis with a constant speed N = 60 rev/min.
Simultaneously, the arm is being raised at the constant rate = 4 rad/s. For the position where
= 30 , determine (a) the angular velocity of OA,
(b) the angular acceleration of OA, (c) the velocity
of point A, and (d) the acceleration of point A.
(a) Since the arm OA is rotating about both the
x- and the z-axes, it has the components x =
= 4 rad/s and z = 2N/60 = 6.28 rad/s.
The angular velocity is
= x + z = 4i + 6.28k rad/s

(7)

(b) The angular acceleration of OA is

=
x+
z

(8)

Since z is not changing in magnitude or direction,

z = 0. x is changing direction and
has a derivative which is

x = z x = 25.1j rad/s2

(9)

Therefore,
= 25.1j rad/s2

= r + ( r)
(12)
2
= 20.1i 38.4j 6.40k m/s (13)

(10)

(c) With the position vector of A given by r =

0.693j + 0.4k m, the velocity of A becomes
v = r = 4.35i 1.60j + 2.77k m/s (11)
2