Sliding on an Arbitrarily Shaped Incline with Friction

Abstract

Friction is one of the most important forces studied in classical mechanics, and still is the subject of pedagogical literature. In a small series of problems stated below, we consider a particle sliding down a curve under the actions of gravity and kinetic friction. Unlike many of the referenced sources, we neglect the centripetal force arising on the curved portions of the incline (i.e., assume that the centripetal acceleration is much smaller than g) and, instead of parameters such as the location of the release point of a particle, concentrate on the horizontal displacement of the particle.

Development of a Modular Didactic Laboratory Set for the Experimental Study of Friction

“…Usually flat, sometimes arbitrarily shaped [23], an inclined plane has been used for a very long time to demonstrate basic sliding and rolling friction concepts. In recent years those experiments are often accompanied by video analysis [24].…”