Center of mass of a solid hemisphere (where's the error)?

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Homework Help Overview

The discussion revolves around determining the center of mass of a solid hemisphere. The original poster presents their approach and expresses confusion over an unexpected result, suggesting a potential error in their calculations.

Discussion Character

  • Exploratory, Assumption checking, Mathematical reasoning

Approaches and Questions Raised

  • The original poster describes their method involving the consideration of small rings at varying distances from the center and attempts to derive the center of mass using symmetry arguments. Some participants question the assumptions made regarding the thickness of the disks used in the calculations.

Discussion Status

Participants are actively engaging with the original poster's reasoning, identifying potential errors in the formulation of the thickness of the disks. There is a collaborative effort to clarify these points, with some participants providing corrections without offering complete solutions.

Contextual Notes

The discussion includes a focus on the geometric considerations of the problem, particularly the dimensions of the elements involved in the calculation. The original poster expresses awareness of alternative methods that yield the correct result but seeks to understand their specific miscalculation.

rahul.mishra
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On finding the center of mass of a solid hemisphere i came up with some different result.

Here's what i did...

consider a small ring at a distance r from the center of the hemisphere and one more ring at a distance
of r+dr from center of the ring.

let, mass of the small element formed by the two rings be dm
so,

dm = http://data.artofproblemsolving.com/images/latex/1/8/9/189c6482a7f0b088a7d84607b3df5837533486eb.gif

Clearly by symmetry w.r.t origin taken Xcm = 0

now, Ycm = 1/M http://data.artofproblemsolving.com/images/latex/f/4/e/f4e81964f7df0126c6c05827f0d5f0b972fc5f45.gif = 1/M http://data.artofproblemsolving.com/images/latex/9/a/a/9aabc0767384d5b00970c757ff71f80cd37d11eb.gif

but we all know this is maybe absurd... its 3R/8 actually...

don't give me an alternate way... i know it gives the right result...
but where am i wrong in my soln?
 
Last edited by a moderator:
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You made a little error: the thickness of the disk is not

$$
r d\theta
$$

but

$$
r\sin \theta d\theta
$$
- the disk has its height in y direction.
 
ya... got it.. but the thickness of the small element is rcosθdθ and not rsinθdθ maybe. I am quite sure as it gave me the correct result :) !
 
Ah, you're right, it's cos theta.
 

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