Saturday, September 22, 2007

Energy in SHM


There are two types of energy graphs , one w.r.t time and other w.r.t displacement . Very often three different energy namely KE, PE and TE are drawn using the same axes. Graphs w.r.t time take on the shape of sine square or cosine square but with twice the frequency of the displacement- time graph. Graphs w.r.t displacement takes on parabolic shape. Practice drawing as you need to know which is KE and PE.There are too many energy equations . In fact you only need to know KE to know PE. Therefore ignore PE equations. If you know the velocity and maximum velocity , you could find KE and KEm . PE can be obtained by using TE - KE because TE = KEm.