Integrating “moment of inertia” of a fidget-spinner-shape

definite integralsintegrationmathematical physicsphysicspolar coordinates

I'm sorry to ask this once again, but I've explained it with a better explanation.

The problem is,

Calculate "moment of inertia" of a fidget-spinner-shape (blue part).

(radius of a circle is R, and its center is 2R away from the origin.)

I've tried with integration in polar coordinate, but I got stuck in it.

Here is the picture:
enter image description here

This is where I got stuck:

Let the total mass M

Let's just calculate the part that looks like this

enter image description here

The polar equation for the circle would be $r^2=4rcos\theta-3$ such that $r=2cos\theta + \sqrt{4(cos\theta)^2 -3}$

so $\int \int M \frac{rdrd\theta}{AreaColored}r^2$

$r$ is not constant, so we have to put $r$ in.

It is so complicated in this way. I think there could be better ideas.

———————–little explanation about the moment of inertia——————

To calculate the moment of inertia of arbitrary shape,

you have to integrate $dI$ for both $r$ and $\theta$

Basically $dI=dm r^2$ , $\int_0^R \int_0^\pi (function) dr d\theta$ in polar coordinates.

If the total mass is M, then $dm=M\frac{(partial-area)}{(total-area)}$

———————————–_—————————————————

Best Answer

In each of the figures below, the cross represents the centre of rotation. enter image description hereenter image description here

Denote the moment of inertia of the region $S_i$ by $I(S_i)$. The moment of inertia of the fidget spinner is $6I(S_1)+3I(S_4)-6I(S_3)+6I(S_2)$.

Using the parallel axis theorem, it can be deduced that $I(S_4)=I(S_8)+4MR^2$ and that $I(S_1)=I(S_7)+MR^2$. It should be obvious that $I(S_6)=I(S_8)/3$.

The center of mass of region $S_5$ is at a distance of $\frac{R}{2\sqrt{2}}$ from the centre of rotation so we can use the parallel axis theorem again to deduce that $I(S_2)=I(S_5)+MR^2((2-\frac{1}{2\sqrt{2}})^2-1/8)$.

Finally, the distance between the centre of mass of $S_6$ and the centre of rotation turns out to be $\frac{3\sqrt3}{2\pi}$. So $I(S_3)=I(S_6)+MR^2((2-\frac{3\sqrt3}{2\pi})^2-\frac{27}{2\pi})$.

Now all we need to do is to find $I(S_8)$, $I(S_5)$, $I(S_7)$, either by calculating them or by looking them up on Wikipedia.

As it turns out, $I(S_5)=\frac{5}{12}MR^2$, $I(S_7)=MR^2/4$ and $I(S_8)=MR^2/2$.

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