I want to see whether certain oscillations in my daily life, such as the oscillation of violin strings when plucked, are simple harmonic motion or not. Can we identify whether an oscillation is simple harmonic motion or just an oscillation by observing it?
I don't truly understand the difference between the two – mathematically, we know that acceleration should be proportional to negative displacement for simple harmonic motion. Am I right when I say that an oscillation, such as violin strings oscillating when plucked, cannot be identified to be either a regular oscillation or simple harmonic motion until its motion is precisely tracked and analysed?
Best Answer
For your example of a violin string, you can immediately determine that it is not simple harmonic motion by listening to it. Simple harmonic motion is a pure tone of a single frequency. Violins don't sound like that so you immediately know there are harmonics and it therefore is not a simple harmonic oscillator. As some other people have mentioned, a tuning fork produces a very pure tone and so it's a very good approximation to a simple harmonic oscillator.