Brown University Physics 0050/0070

Physics Department Torsion Pendulum

Torsion Pendulum
Envision a rope hanging from a tree. Now, imagine that you, being the eco-friendly tree-hugging
Brown student that you are, decide to spend some quality time with the tree. First, you jump on
the rope and swing back and forth, simulating a simple pendulum, just like the ones you learned
about in your Physics class. After you and the rope come to rest once more, you’re still not
satisfied with your rope-tree experience, so you wind up the rope, jump on, and let the rope
unwind while you experience the thrills of acceleration. The rope keeps winding up and
unwinding until it eventually slows to a halt.

Figure 1. Depiction of an average Brown student

on a torsion pendulum

You’ve just been part of another type of pendulum! This type of pendulum, called a torsion
pendulum, is reliant on the intrinsic properties of the torsion wire (the rope in this case) – that is,
how easily it twists (and twists back). Similar to a spring constant, where higher constant means
the spring is more rigid, ropes and strings also have a torsion constant k. In the rest of this
write-up, we’ll show you how to calculate the torsion constant.

Theory
When a wire is twisted, it develops what is called a restoring torque τ in order to return to its rest
position. When the wire is twisted by a small angle θ, we can model τ from the formula

  k 1.)

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Physics Department Torsion Pendulum

As there are no other forces acting on the string, and from our studies of rotational motion, we know
that our rotational system is (note that we are neglecting the small frictional damping force):

I    k 2.)

where I is the moment of inertia in the system, and  is angular acceleration. The above equation
can also be written as

d 2
I   k 3.)
dt 2

A solution to the above differential equation is (you can easily check the math):

 (t )  A cos(t   ) 4.)

k
Upon taking the second derivative of  we find that   . Then
I

4 2
k  I 2  I 5.)
T2

Torsion Pendulum Experiment

The figure to the left is a model of the experiment you’ll conduct. A

ી weight, comprised of two adjustable spheres along lengthwise cylindrical
beams. The weight should be symmetrical; you may need to adjust the
position of the spheres accordingly so that the weight balances. This
weight is attached to a torsion wire; please be gentle with the wire, as it
can break fairly easily.

When the pendulum is at rest, find a way to mark the weight’s

orientation. This is important to tell when a period has been completed.

Using an implement of your choosing, lightly tap the sphere, causing it

to rotate along the x-y axis. Start the stop watch at the same time. This
may be tricky, as the weight is very inclined to over-rotating; you’re
looking to only rotate the wire by about 20 degrees before it reverses
direction. Record the length of a period (should be a minute or higher, have patience).

Stop the pendulum; once it is once again at rest, repeat the above step two more times. Average
the times to obtain the average period
length.

Once you’ve obtained the data, carefully

remove the weight from the clamp. Take

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Physics Department Torsion Pendulum

necessary distance measurements for the moment of inertia:

Object Inertia Formula

Beam (mbeam * L2) / 12
Cylinder (mcyl * r2cyl) / 2
Sphere mr2sphere

After the distance measurements are taken, remove the spheres from the apparatus and determine
the necessary masses.

Calculate the total inertia; be sure your formula for total inertia is correct. You now have all
necessary data to calculate the torsion constant k. You can also vary the distance rsphere by
loosening the set screw and moving the spheres, from equation 5 you can easily see that

T 2  C (a  2mrsphere
2
) 6.)

4 2
Where a  I beam  I Cylinder and C  .
k

2
Plot T 2 vs rsphere for several different values of rsphere and verify equation 6, you should have a
straight line with slope 8m 2 / k .

Note that the torsional fiber in this experiment is the same as that in the Pasco Coulomb balance,
so this experiment can be used as an alternate method to determine the Coulomb balance
torsional constant k. A torsional pendulum is also an integral part of the Cavendish experiment to
determine Newton’s gravitational constant G. In the Cavendish experiment, the torsional
pendulum is enclosed in a glass case so you can’t disturb it once it is set in motion. In this
experiment feel free to experiment with torsional pendulum (touch it, disassemble and
reassemble it, etc.).

Optional Investigation of Frictional Damping:

Frictional damping was important in the analysis of the Cavendish torsional pendulum data. It
can also be investigated in this experiment quite simply using a motion detector, computer, and
the Pasco Science workshop interface (and a little patience).Some sample student data (figure 1)
is shown below. The equations of motion of the torsional pendulum with damping are:

d 2 d
I 2
  k   (t) (7.)
dt dt

where  is the damping coefficient. With no driving force,  (t )  0 (as in this experiment), the
solution of equation 7 is as follows:

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 (t )  Ae t cos(t   ) (8.)


Here   and    / I   / 2 I  . When there is small damping (   I ) then one
2

2I
finds    / I as expected. The motion detector will measure the y component of the
oscillatory motion which will have the form y (t )  y max e t cos(t   ) .From the computer plot
determine the period of oscillation. How close is it to T  2 I /  ?

Optional advanced analysis: see if you can curve fit your data to this equation and extract  and
 from your fit. Some plotting/data analysis software (eg KaleidaGraph) have exp()cos() macros
in their math libraries to simplify the curve fitting for you. Is   I as expected?

Frictional damping observed with a motion detector and Data Studio. It’s important to start the pendulum with a
controlled amount of energy that’s small enough to stay within the range of the motion detector, but also large
enough such that damping can be observed. Due to external vibrations, the pendulum will not dampen completely.

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