There is a point mass on a sinusoid path. The height of the curve is described by the equation where . The initial position of the point is and starts moving from rest.
Find the period of the motion in seconds to the nearest integer.
Details and Assumptions :
There is no friction between the body and the surface.
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Because there is no friction we can write the conservation of energy and find the velocity of the body at any point given as follows: m g y 0 = 2 1 m v 2 + m g y ( x ) v = 2 g ( y 0 − y ( x ) ) But v = d t d s where d s is the arc element of the curve. In our case: d s = 1 + y ′ 2 ( x ) d x Substituting in the formula for v we get: d t d x 1 + y ′ 2 ( x ) = 2 g ( y 0 − y ( x ) ) Rearranging: d t = 2 g ( y 0 − y ( x ) ) 1 + y ′ 2 ( x ) d x Now we will integrate only on a half of the motion and then we will multiply our result by 2: 0 ∫ T d t = 0 . 7 ∫ 2 π − 0 . 7 2 0 ( cos ( 0 . 7 ) − cos ( x ) ) 1 + sin 2 ( x ) d x T = 2 . 0 0 1 8 4 So the final result is P = 2 T = 4 . 0 0 3 6 s