Chapter 11 Angular Momentum

Section 11.1 Vector products, torque

1. (a) If G = 3 i – 2 j + k and H = 2 i + j + k, find G x H. (b) What is the angle of this result with vector G?
With H?

2. Suppose A = i + j and B = i + 3 j. (a) Draw these vectors in the x-y plane and use the right-hand rule for cross
products to predict the direction of A x B. (b) Calculate the vector A x B and confirm your answer to part a. (c)
Find the angle between A and B.

3. (a) Assume a tension of 1500 N in the rope at the right

and calculate the approximate torque exerted on the statue
about the statue's feet. State the estimates you make for
this calculation. (b) State the direction of this torque.

4. Suppose A = 4 j, and the cross product A x B gives a

result in the +k direction. What can be said about B from
this information?

Section 11.2-11.3 Angular Momentum

5. A 0.80-kgblue-footed booby flying overhead has a
position vector given by r(t) = 12 t i + 4.0 j meters, from http://scottnelson.photoshelter.com/gall 1
the point of view of an observer on the ground. What is
the bird's angular momentum about this observer, as a function of time?

6. A javelin of mass m is thrown upward with initial velocity v, at angle θ above the horizontal. Determine the
javelin's angular momentum about the thrower (a) immediately after the throw, (b) when it reaches its maximum
height, and (c) just before it strikes the ground. (d) What causes the javelin's angular momentum to change?

7. A standing man extends his hand horizontally 0.80 m from the center of his body and drops a 0.10-kg raw egg
from a height of 1.50 m. (a) What is the torque about the man's feet exerted by gravity on the egg as it falls? (b)
How much time does it take the egg to fall? (c) What is the speed of the egg just before it hits the ground? (d)
Use the speed calculated in part c to determine the angular momentum of the egg about the man's feet. (e) What
is the relationship among the quantities calculated in parts a, b and d?

8. A 4.0-kg bowling ball of radius 12 cm rolls at 11 m/s down a lane. What is the ball's angular momentum about
its center?

9. A 100-kg platform of radius 2.0 m at a playground is rotating at 2.4

rad/s. It may be modeled as a disk. A 30-kg boy stands 1.2 m from its
center. His 60-kg mother sits at the center of the disk; she may be modeled
as a point mass. What is the angular momentum of this three-mass system
about the center of the platform?

Section 11.4 Conservation of Angular Momentum

10. The boy in the previous problem moves to the center of the platform to
give his mother a hug. (a) When his radius becomes zero, with what http://www.squidoo.com/merry-go-rounds 1
angular velocity is the disk rotating? (b) What torque causes the platform
to gain angular velocity?
11. A girl is repairing her bicycle—she has it upside-down with the wheels
in the air; they are stationary but free to rotate. The wheels may be assumed
to be rings of mass 0.90 kg and radius 35 cm. A sticky pine cone of mass
0.080 kg falls from a tree branch, hits one tire with a speed of 14 m/s, and
sticks. It strikes the tire 20 cm from a vertical line passing through the tire's
center. What is the angular speed of tire plus pine cone after this collision?

12. A disk of mass 3.0 kg and radius 15 cm is rotating on a vertical axis at 12 radians
per second. A rod of length 40 cm and mass 1.8 kg is mounted on the same axis and is
initially stationary. The axis passes through its center. The rod is then let down gently
onto the rotating disk. They slip for 8.0 seconds, at the end of which they are rotating at
the same rate. (a) What is the final angular velocity of the disk and rod? (b) How much
torque did the rod exert on the disk during those 8.0 seconds? (c) How much torque did
the disk exert on the rod?

13. The red disk at the right, with mass 0.200 kg, is traveling in a circle of
radius 0.400 m on a frictionless table, held in by a string which passes
through the table. Initially the disk is traveling with a speed of 1.20 m/s, but
as the string is pulled from below and the radius of the circle shrinks, the
disk's speed increases. (a) Why can we assume that the disk's angular
momentum about the center of the circle remains constant, even though there
is clearly a force exerted on it by the string? (b) Suppose that the disk is
pulled in just a centimeter, so that the radius of the circle is now 0.390 m.
Determine the new velocity of the disk. (c) What is the change of kinetic
energy of the disk? (d) Where does this kinetic energy come from? (e) The
change in radius is so small that we will use the approximation that the
tension in the string remains constant. How much work is done on the disk as it moves to its new radius? (f) How
does this work compare with the change in kinetic energy of the disk?

14. (a) If the disk above were pulled from a radius of 0.400 m to a radius of 0.100 m, what would be its change in
kinetic energy? (b) Use integration to determine the work done on the disk as it is pulled to this new radius.

15. (more challenging) A bowling ball of mass m and radius R is projected down the level
lane toward the pins. This solid sphere is not initially rotating, but merely sliding with speed
vo; however, it has a coefficient of friction µ with the lane, and it eventually rolls without any
slipping. (a) Use the methods of dynamics (F = m a and τ = I α) to find the bowling
ball's speed when it rolls without slipping. (b) Check your answer using conservation
of angular momentum. (Consider the point where the bowling ball first makes
contact with the lane. Since the force of friction acting on the bowling ball is always directed toward this point,
there is no torque due to friction about this point.)