Question

5.45. Keeping contact ** A frictionless circle of radius R is made out of a strip of metal and held fixed in a vertical plane. Amassless spring with spring constant k has one end attached to the bottom point on he inside surface of he circle, and the other end attached to a mass m. The spring is compressed to zer length with the mass touchin the inside surface o the c le at bottom. (Whatever negligible length of spring remains is essentially horizontal.) The spring is then released, and the mass gets pushed initially to the right and then up along the circle; the setup at a random later time is shown in Fig. 5.33. Let ( be the equilibrium length of the spring. What is the minimum value of ( for which the mass remains in contact with the circle at all times?

Answer 1