PROBLEMS OF EVOLUTION OF RIGID BODY MOTION SIMILAR TO LAGRANGE TOP

Abstract

The problem of evolution of the rigid body rotations about a fixed point continues to attract the attention of researches. In many cases, the motion in the Lagrange case can be regarded as a generating motion of the rigid body. In this case the body is assumed to have a fixed point and to be in the gravitational field, with the center of mass of the body and the fixed point both lying on the dynamic symmetry axes of the body. A restoring torque, analogues to the moment of the gravity forces, is created by the aerodynamic forces acting on the body in the gas flow. Therefore, the motions, close to the Lagrange case, have been investigated in a number of works on the aircraft dynamics, where various perturbation torques were taken into account in addition to the restoring torque. Many works have studied the rotational motion of a heavy rigid body about a fixed point under the action of perturbation and restoring torques. The correction of the studied models is carried out by taking into account external and internal perturbation factors of various physical nature as well as relevant assumptions according to unperturbed motion. The results of reviewed works may be of interest to specialists in the field of rigid body dynamics, gyroscopy, and applications of asymptotic methods. The authors of this papers present a new approach for the investigation of perturbed motions of Lagrange top for perturbations which assumes averaging with respect to the phase of the nutation angle. Nonlinear equations of motions are simplified and solved explicitly, so that the description of motion is obtained. Asymptotic approach permits to obtain some qualitative results and to describe evolution of rigid body motion using simplified averaged equations. Thus it is possible to avoid numerical integration. The authors present a unified approach to the dynamics of angular motions of rigid bodies subject to perturbation torques of different physical nature. These papers contains both the basic foundations of the rigid body dynamics and the application of the asymptotic method of averaging. The approach based on the averaging procedure is applicable to rigid bodies closed to Lagrange gyroscope. The presented brief survey does not purport to be complete and can be expanded. However, it is clear from this survey that there is an literature on the dynamics of rigid body moving about a fixed point under the influence of perturbation torques of various physical nature. The research in this area is in connection with the problems of motion of flying vehicles, gyroscopes, and other objects of modern technology