Study of equations for Tippe Top and related rigid bodies

• Main Author: Rutstam, Nils
• Format: Others
• Language: English
• Published: Linköpings universitet, Tillämpad matematik 2010
• Subjects: MATHEMATICS; MATEMATIK
• Online Access: http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:liu:diva-60835; http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:isbn:978-91-7393-298-1

The Tippe Top consist of a small truncated sphere with a peg as a handle. When it is spun fast enough on its spherical part it starts to turn upside down and ends up spinning on the peg. This counterintuitive behaviour, called inversion, is a curious feature of this dynamical system that has been studied for some time, but obtaining a complete description of the dynamics of inversion has proved to be a difficult problem. The existing results are either numerical simulations of the equations of motion or asymptotic analysis that shows that the inverted position is the only attractive and stable position under certain conditions. This thesis will present methods to analyze the equations of motion of the Tippe Top, which we study in three equivalent forms that each helps us to understand different aspects of the inversion phenomenon. Our study of the Tippe Top also focuses on the role of the underlying assumptions in the standard model for the external force, and what consequences these assumptions have, in particular for the asymptotic cases. We define two dynamical systems as an aid to understand the dynamics of the Tippe Top, the gliding heavy symmetric top and the gliding eccentric cylinder. The gliding heavy symmetric top is a natural non-integrable generalization of the well-known heavy symmetric top. Equations of motion and asymptotics for this system are derived, but we also show that equations for the gliding heavy symmetric top can be obtained as a limit of the equations for the Tippe Top. The equations for the gliding eccentric cylinder can be interpreted as a special case of the equations for the Tippe Top, and since it is a simpler system, properties of the Tippe Top equations are easier to study. In particular, asymptotic analysis of the gliding eccentric cylinder reveals that the standard model seems to have inconsistencies that need to be addressed.