Question

(b) Professor Calculus from the TinTin comics is walking up and down valleys and hills, quite oblivious to everything around him, as he carefully observes a swinging bob at the end of a string. Occasionally, he stops and measures the period of the pendulum.

(i) Give the formula for the frequency in terms of the period. Then give a formula for the frequency of a pendulum motion for small oscillations, in terms of the length L of the string.

(ii) Professor Calculus observes that the period changes from one location to the next. What could account for this change?

(iii)Professor Calculus comes close to an enormous meteorite made up purely of gold (something really dense and heavy). How does the frequency change?

(iv) Professor Calculus gets a different answer when he is in the Himalayan mountains compared to when he is at sea level. Use an equation from the Mechanics section involving G to explain this phenomenon.

Answer 1