Data Sheet

The amazing gyro
YOU WILL NEED
HERE’S HOW
1
to
7
Assemble the gyroscope model.
8
Place one of the rip cords through the rip
cord slot in the side of the gyroscope. Pull
the rip cord quickly and forcefully to start
the gyroscope’s rotor turning. Hold the
gyroscope in your hand and turn it upside
down.
9
Turn the gyroscope from side-to-side,
both with and against the direction that
the rotor disk in the gyroscope is spinning.
Try balancing it on its corner.
WHAT’S HAPPENING
Do you feel the force that makes it so difficult to tip the
gyroscope? What you’re experiencing is something called
the gyroscopic effect. It arises when an object (the rotor
disk, in this case) spins very rapidly. The force that you
feel when you tip the gyroscope is the gyroscope trying
to maintain the disk’s axis of rotation, the invisible line
about which the disk is rotating.
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2 3
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Flip over
x
1 2 76 11 23
3124
19 21
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10 x 1 x 2 x 2 x
2 x
1 x
1 x
5 x 3 x 2 x
1 x
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The Gyroscopic Effect
EXPERIMENT 1