MIT Physics Demo -- Center of Mass Trajectory

Odd-shaped objects with their centers of mass marked by orange paint are thrown. While the objects appear to follow very wobbly trajectories when viewed under bright lights, under black lights you can see that their centers of mass travel in smooth parabolas.

Then center of mass is not necessarily in the center of an object, as demonstrated by the last object in the video (a weighted disk).

See the original video on MIT TechTV - http://techtv.mit.edu/videos/773-center-of-mass-trajectory

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[TheCGBro]

FYI: Found it! Wikipedia

Locating the center of mass

Plumb line method

An experimental method for locating the center of mass is to suspend the object from two locations and to drop plumb lines from the suspension points. The intersection of the two lines is the center of mass.

[TheCGBro]

Fantastic demo!! How do you find the center of mass of an object?

-TheCGBros

[lovelplants]

oh cool demo.

[ananyakirti]

@ noobs center of mass becomes the center of gravity when the object is under free fall.

This experiment proves that all objects/ system can be treated as a point mass at the center of mass.  Duh!

[TheW11man]

I dont get it.. what was this supposed to prove??

[diogene4994]

The center of gravity is not always where the center of mass is.

[demonshubham]

SHITY INDIA ! U R NOT EVEN CLOSE TO MIT'S

[zombiekiller1130]

great... this actually proves that the center of mass of any particle follows the same path as that of the projectile thrown. .....

[QuiteTheBalls]

watching scientists try to catch things... fun!

[forscyvus]

@mouwest Yeah thats a common synonym for it. I'm pretty sure its TECHnically incorrect but yeah