Distance round a circle
Discussion
Ok usually I'm quite good at things like this and I'm the one who ends up explaining things to other people when they are convinced its black magic but this one has me a bit stumped and its probably primary school engineering really.
The beginning bit of this video where he is rolling the wheel along a linear surface and then around a wheel.
I get that the centre of the wheel is travelling the same distance along its length when its a flat surface but it has to travel a lot farther when its going round in a circle so the wheel has to rotate twice to cover that greater distance but.... how does the tyre know its going round in a circle and not along a flat track, it has traction on the surface and the outer edge is traveling along the exact same length but it isn't skidding along to do the extra rotation.
The only thing I can think of is because the surface is now curved then there is less contact area so it has to do more revolutions but that could be well wide of the mark for all I know. I just can't get my head round this for now.
The beginning bit of this video where he is rolling the wheel along a linear surface and then around a wheel.
I get that the centre of the wheel is travelling the same distance along its length when its a flat surface but it has to travel a lot farther when its going round in a circle so the wheel has to rotate twice to cover that greater distance but.... how does the tyre know its going round in a circle and not along a flat track, it has traction on the surface and the outer edge is traveling along the exact same length but it isn't skidding along to do the extra rotation.
The only thing I can think of is because the surface is now curved then there is less contact area so it has to do more revolutions but that could be well wide of the mark for all I know. I just can't get my head round this for now.
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