Tuesday 24 July 2012

How to balance two forks on a toothpick

I posted a video a while ago about balancing forks on the rim of a cup:












This trick can be easily made using just 2 forks, 1 stick and a glass.
Your eyes won't believe it, but physics laws have not been violated in the making of this video.


The physics behind it


The center of mass of the system (forks + stick) falls around the middle of the stick, which lies exactly on the pivot.

That is the most stable position giving then stable equilibrium. Even for small displacements the system is balanced by a restoring torque.

Moreover, the system remain balanced even if half of the stick is burned, because the missing weight of the burned stick is negligible with respect to the weight of the whole system, then the center of mass approximately stays in the same position as before.


How to make it


The making of follows three simple steps:

1.   Put a toothpick (or any stick that can stand the weight of two forks) between the teeth of a fork.

2.   Take another fork (of the same kind) and push its teeth between the ones of the first fork. This is the most difficult bit as most of the times, the two forks and the toothpick will not stick together (you could use glue at this point without making the trick pointless, but I managed to do it without glue).

3.   Put the structure on any edge, trying to find the point on which it will balance (no glue allowed at this point). You will find it by the pressure on your fingers while you try to do it. The point depends on the shape of the forks and in my case the centre of mass fell on the middle of the toothpick.

3b.   Impress your friends!


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