Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
Consequently, the object is in a state of static mechanical equilibrium. In classical mechanics, a particle is in mechanical equilibrium if the net force on that particle is zero. [1]: 39 By extension, a physical system made up of many parts is in mechanical equilibrium if the net force on each of its individual parts is zero. [1]: 45–46 [2]
The static equilibrium of a particle is an important concept in statics. A particle is in equilibrium only if the resultant of all forces acting on the particle is equal to zero. In a rectangular coordinate system the equilibrium equations can be represented by three scalar equations, where the sums of forces in all three directions are equal ...
Mechanical equilibrium, the state in which the sum of the forces, and torque, on each particle of the system is zero; Radiative equilibrium, the state where the energy radiated is balanced by the energy absorbed; Secular equilibrium, a state of radioactive elements in which the production rate of a daughter nucleus is balanced by its own decay rate
A contact equilibrium may be regarded also as an exchange equilibrium. There is a zero balance of rate of transfer of some quantity between the two systems in contact equilibrium. For example, for a wall permeable only to heat, the rates of diffusion of internal energy as heat between the two systems are equal and opposite.
The word equilibrium implies a state of balance. Equilibrium thermodynamics, in origins, derives from analysis of the Carnot cycle. Here, typically a system, as cylinder of gas, initially in its own state of internal thermodynamic equilibrium, is set out of balance via heat input from a combustion reaction. Then, through a series of steps, as ...
A quasi-static thermodynamic process can be visualized by graphically plotting the path of idealized changes to the system's state variables. In the example, a cycle consisting of four quasi-static processes is shown. Each process has a well-defined start and end point in the pressure-volume state space.
The static friction increases or decreases in response to the applied force up to an upper limit determined by the characteristics of the contact between the surface and the object. [3] A static equilibrium between two forces is the most usual way of measuring forces, using simple devices such as weighing scales and spring balances.
An example of a quasi-static process that is not idealizable as reversible is slow heat transfer between two bodies on two finitely different temperatures, where the heat transfer rate is controlled by a poorly conductive partition between the two bodies. In this case, no matter how slowly the process takes place, the state of the composite ...