Mass of cylinder from hanging weight fall time

  • Thread starter Thread starter doub
  • Start date Start date
  • Tags Tags
    Cylinder Mass
Join the discussion
Registration is free. Start your own thread to ask a follow-up.
3 replies · 5K views
doub
Messages
15
Reaction score
0

Homework Statement



A light string is wrapped around a solid cylinder and a 300 g mass hangs from the free end of the string, as shown. When released, the mass falls a distance 54 cm in 3.0 s. Calculate the mass of the cylinder?


Homework Equations



not sure


The Attempt at a Solution



I have gotten as far as to determine the Tension on the string of -2.9N. Without known the radius of the cylinder I feel that the mass cannot be determined.

Granted these are study question but if the final is going to be like this...yikes
 
Physics news on Phys.org
hi doub! :smile:
doub said:
A light string is wrapped around a solid cylinder and a 300 g mass hangs from the free end of the string, as shown. When released, the mass falls a distance 54 cm in 3.0 s. Calculate the mass of the cylinder?
…
Without known the radius of the cylinder I feel that the mass cannot be determined.

the motion depends on what i call the rolling mass of the cylinder, I/r2, which is always half the actual mass! :wink:

carry on … you should find that the radius cancels out :smile:​
 
The best I can get is

[itex]\alpha[/itex] = (T1 + T2)/I

= (Fr - Tr)/1/2 mr2

= (mra -(ma+mg)r)/ 1/2 mr2

don't see how the radiii cancel each other though
 
doub said:
[itex]\alpha[/itex] = (T1 + T2)/I

= (Fr - Tr)/1/2 mr2

= (mra -(ma+mg)r)/ 1/2 mr2

sorry, i don't understand any of this :redface:

you should have an F = ma equation and a τ = Iα equation