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Standard Results
The centre of mass of a uniform solid hemisphere of radius r lies on the axis
of symmetry at a distance of 3r/8 from the base
We know that the centre of mass lies on the red line, since this is a line
of symmetry of the object.
If we label this line the x-axis and introduce a y-axis as follows, this will
allow is to use calculus:
Each strip is a distance of x from the y-axis. The mass of each strip is its
volume density. The volume of each strip is just its area, since it is a
lamina and so has no depth. The area of each strip is x 2y .
We are told that the body is uniform, which means that the density is
constant. It doesn't matter what the density is, lets call it . So the mass
of each strip is 2yx.
Now the total area of the semicircle is r2 . So the total mass is r2.
(distance of centre of mass from O) (weight of body) = the sum of: (the
mass of each particle) (the distance of each particle from O)
Therefore: (centre of mass) r2 = 2y x x . The sum is from x = 0
to x = r .
(centre of mass) r2 =
2y xdx .
Therefore:
(Centre of mass) r2 =
2x2 dx
of splitting the object into strips, split it into discs, each of thickness x,
radius y and distance x from the y-axis.
One very useful formula is: