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vcsharp2003
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Homework Statement
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A uniform cylinder with radius r is rolling down an incline without slipping as shown in diagram below. It's angular acceleration is α and acceleration of it's center of mass C is a. What will be the linear acceleration of point of contact P and another point Q on the cylinder ? Assume that points P and Q on the cylinder lie along a circle with center as C.
I have tried to find the linear acceleration by adding linear acceleration vectors resulting from pure rotation and pure translation, but I am not sure if this approach is the right approach in this case. Or whether I am missing something.
Homework Equations
Linear acceleration resulting from pure rotation for any point on cylinder is given by cross product below.
$$\overrightarrow{a_t} = \overrightarrow{\alpha} \times \overrightarrow{r} \\ \text { where }\overrightarrow{r} \text { is the radius vector for point in question having a magnitude of } {r}$$
The Attempt at a Solution
The motion of cylinder can be considered as having pure rotation defined by angular acceleration as well as pure translation defined by acceleration of center of mass. So linear acceleration of each point will be the vector sum of acceleartions resulting from rotation and translation.
$$\therefore\overrightarrow{a_p} = \overrightarrow{\alpha} \times \overrightarrow{r_p} + \overrightarrow{a} \\
\text {and} \\ \overrightarrow{a_q} = \overrightarrow{\alpha} \times \overrightarrow{r_q} + \overrightarrow{a}$$