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Snow Day: Unusual Tracks
🕑 Added 2018-03-05 01:02:25 +0000 UTC Well, the snowy world is full of interesting things to think about, and I thought I'd shoot a behind-the-scenes or dogwalk video just for you. And then as I was doing that I thought why not put a little more effort in and make it public on my main channel?So, that happened.
Ok now let's talk about wobblers. There's some great ones at the Museum of Mathematics in NY (if they still have that exhibit on the floor) made out of solids of revolution with a twist: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L_z04poueUA
The cool thing about them is that some of the wobbly paths actually roll against gravity in sections!
The wobbly roller in the video is a Rolling Trefoil by Henry Segerman (who you may remember from last video): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fVjcDBBrn-A (available on shapeways!)
Also of wobbly interest are Rattlebacks, which if you haven't heard of you must see: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=11NHjiEYnI0
So yep, I cheated and worked through the weekend but it wasn't on the Pi Day video so it doesn't count, right? And gotta get the snow while its fresh!
Thank you for inspiring me to make a fun little video about snow and tracks and wobbly things and icicles :D
Vi Hart
Comments
Vi Hart
Also friction! And there's also lots of interesting mathematics to how to get the center of gravity of things to stay constant, because if the center of gravity is wobbling up and down that'll cause it to slow and eventually settle into its settled position (when it no longer has enough momentum to "roll uphill" to an unstable orientation). There's lots of good questions involved with super-wobbly wobblers :D
Ah, ok, if it finds a low spot it would require energy to move since any direction would be uphill. Damn. There goes our perpetual motion patent.
Help. Why would a wobbler ever stop rolling? It would have to be perfectly balanced on the two points of contact. Tiny little flat spots? Meanwhile, thanks for taking us for a walk in those magnificent trees.
Rajat Tibrewal
There is such a bucket load to observe if you choose to just LOOK! Thanks for the inspiration Vi :)
