ABSTRACT
The design of instrument mechanisms should be based firmly upon an understanding of both static and dynamic forces. We exploit their action on rigid bodies and on elastic systems where there is intentional subsequent distortion. A brief review of introductory mechanics models is therefore included here to establish the analytic techniques that are used regularly in this book. The key aspect of the statics section is simple elasticity and beam theory. Because the majority of instrument structures are relatively rigid, dynamic analysis concentrates on energy methods and, especially, on Lagrange’s Equation. Although seeming laborious for very simple systems, we advocate this approach because it is highly systematic and may readily be applied to complex dynamical systems. The dynamics of distributed bodies are considered through the vibration of beams‚ including Rayleigh’s method for the simple estimation of fundamental frequencies of vibration.
