Question #274

This is a follow-up to Question # 273.

I hold the bicycle wheel gyroscope as seen in the photograph below and rotate it clockwise as viewed from above, as seen in an mpeg video by clicking your mouse on the photograph. Again, this is not very interesting because the bicycle wheel is not spinning, but we all now know that it will become more interesting if we were to spin the bicycle wheel before rotating it.

Suppose that we were to spin the wheel so that the edge closest to the camera is moving upward and the edge closest to my body is moving downward, as seen by clicking your mouse on the photograph below.

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Now suppose that we spin the bicycle wheel as seen immediately above and then rotate the wheel counterclockwise as seen from above. What will the wheel do?

• (a) It will tend to rotate with the end toward the camera moving up.
• (b) It will tend to rotate with the end toward the camera moving down.
• (c) Neither; the vectors cancel out in this case.

Click here for Answer #274 after February 19, 2007.

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