Balancing a hammer

Mar 28, 2012 21:19

The estimable andrewducker posted yesterday with a picture of a claw hammer suspended in an improbable-looking way, and asked if anyone could replicate it and post a video to YouTube.



Empirical verification of mildly interesting sciencey thing? Sounds like a job for the old Burny Breakfast crew! I decided to go for a metal ruler, since evidently the plastic ones bent a bit, and used a loop of string because I didn't have anything elastic to hand. And here's the YouTube video:

image Click to view


It took a bit of fiddling to get it right, but it's not really really tricky to balance. Despite my clumsiness in the video, it is entirely possible to lift it up and have it swing from your finger. Which, I think, helps to understand the key point that the centre of gravity is directly under the end part of the ruler.

As original-aj mentioned in the comments to andrewducker's post, there's kids toys that work just like this - e.g. a parrot with a long tail which you stick a lump of plasticine to weight down.

This entry crossposted to http://doug.dreamwidth.org/237951.html, where there are
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empirical-discoveries, burny-breakfast

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