Looking for a good undergrad mechanics book

fizziks

The one we're using is insanely horrible. I just don't like how they approach the concepts and examples. It's called Classical Dynamics by Thorton and Marion.

Can anyone recommend some college classical mechanics books?

StatMechGuy

Corben and Stehle's book for Dover is pretty good.

Crosson

Try Taylor, Classical Mechanics.

tim_lou

I have Taylor as the text for my Classical Mechanics and I love it. You might find the first couple chapters less challenging than the others, but things get more interesting after the Lagrangian formalism is introduced. the derivations for things and concepts are easy to read and the book doesn't skip steps when deriving things.

m_haseli

Goldstein is the best in my opinion.

Daverz

I really liked the one I had as an undergrad, Fowles, Analytical Mechanics, 3rd ed.. It's now in it's 7th edition. (Now that really dates me). I hope they haven't screwed it up the subsequent editions.

vjraghavan

The most widely used under grad mechanics books is

"An introduction to Mechanics" by Kleppner and Kolenkow
It has a very good set of examples and exercises.

To read this book, its desirable to be acquainted with mechanics at the level of Halliday, Resnick and Walker and simultaneously do a calculus course which includes, curvilinear orthogonal co-ordinates, ordinary differential equations and vector calculus.

Mechanics by Keith R Symon is an excellent intermediate level book in mechanics that advanced under graduates usually take.

arunma

I used that book just two years ago (I'm guessing mine was sixth or seventh edition). It's still good.

To be honest, if you really want to understand concepts, I would go ahead and get an introductory freshman physics book. Sure, it won't discuss some of the more advanced concepts such as mathematical treatment of air resistance, noninertial reference frames, the tensor form of the moment of inertia, and good old Lagrangian Mechanics (so if that's the stuff you're trying to get a better grasp on, then don't take my advice). But the truth is, those cartoonish pictures and end-of-chapter study guides are actually quite helpful. Just last semester I studied for my optics class out of a freshman book; it gave a far better explanation of the double-slit interference pattern and other related things. If you feel that you must invest in advanced text on classical mechanics, then these guys have certainly provided some great suggestions (especially Fowles). But first, it might be a good idea to dig out your old freshman book and see if that doesn't help you sufficiently.

^_^physicist

The Fowles text is hit-or miss, in my opinion. Either it nails the subject with little confusion, or it proceeds to give you examples and discussion that relates poorly to any practice within the text. This makes you rely on outsides sources, at least in my experance, to determine how to use the methods presented.

With that said, if you purchase Fowles, you can snag the international edition from the Canadian Amazon.com for quite cheap, and with a complementry text from your local university library, the book can be used.

Dr Transport

Barger and Olsson isn't too bad. Becker is a classic but worthwhile reading. Marion and Thornton has gone down hill since Marion passed away and Thornton took it over, get a 1st or 2nd ed of it written by Marion alone and you'll do much better.