A Gyroscope is a device that
depending on its composition can
fulfil two functions to provide
information about the variation of
the orientation of a system with
respect to a reference axis or to
provide information about the
rate at which the orientation of a
system varies when it is rotating
that is its angular velocity
gyroscopes are used in a wide
range of applications including
our phones aeronautics video
game consoles and robotics more
over our own body has a built-in
gyroscope known as the
vestibular system which gives us
information about our orientation
and helps us maintain our balance
that is why in this video we will
see how a gyroscope works
including mechanical Coriolis
effect vibratory and optical
gyroscopes.
let's start by looking at how
mechanical gyroscopes work and
to do that we need to understand
what torque and angular
momentum are in a system with
an axis of rotation when we apply
a force at a point away from the
axis a torque is generated which
rotates the system and is
represented as a vector parallel to
the axis of rotation in addition to
this when a system is rotating it
has an angular momentum as well
which is also represented by a
vector parallel to the axis of
rotation and is determined by two
factors first the moment of inertia
of the system which depends on
its shape and mass distribution
and second the angular velocity
which tells us how many degrees
the system rotates during a
defined period of time
understanding this we can rely on
the operation of an accelerometer
to understand the operation of
this first type of gyroscope in the
previous video we saw how some
of newton's laws could be used to
know the linear acceleration of a
system newton's first law tells us
that when the net force applied
on an object is equal to zero its
acceleration is also zero and
consequently its velocity will
remain constant similarly if we
have a system which is capable of
rotating on an axis and the net
external torque acting on it is zero
the total angular momentum of
the system will also remain
constant on the other hand
newton's second law tells us that
the force applied on an object is
equal to its mass multiplied by the
acceleration generated as a result
of the applied force similarly for
rotating systems the torque of the
net force acting on a system is
equal to the rate of change of its
angular momentum which in this
case is also equal to the moment
of inertia multiplied by the
angular acceleration having
clarified this we can finally focus
on the practical applications of
these principles in mechanical
gyroscopes.
The first application makes use of
the spatial rigidity of a rotating
object if we rotate a disk at a
certain angular velocity and there
are no other forces that generate
any torque on the disc its angular
momentum will be conserved
because of this it will continue to
rotate on the same axis and
therefore maintain its orientation
this was used by Leon Foucault
who mounted a disc on a card and
suspension or gimbal which
allows free rotation of the
centrepiece in this system by
rolling the center disc at a high
speed or in technical terms
applying a large angular
momentum to it its orientation
will not change even if the rest of
the system does in ancient times
when GPS did not exist, they were
extremely useful as an
alternative method of orientation
because unlike compasses which
use the magnetic fields of the
planet to orient themselves and
indicate north this type of
gyroscope could be oriented in
any direction desired and its
accuracy would not be affected by
variations in magnetic fields.
Although of course its limitation is
that the friction of the axis
however small would eventually
reduce the angular momentum of
the disk and similarly the torque
transmitted by the suspension
however small would eventually
change the original orientation
anyway in spite of all this it is still
a valid method for particular cases
at present an example of this is
gravity probe be a satellite used to
test albert einstein's theory of
relativity and whose gyroscopes
could theoretically rotate for up to
fifteen thousand years which by
the way is extremely complex and
a perfect subject for a future
video now going back to the topic.
The second practical application
of mechanical gyroscopes is to
determine the speed of a system
and to do this they take advantage
of a physical phenomenon called
precession in simple terms
precession is a circular motion
that is generated when a rotating
object is affected by a force that
causes it to change its orientation
an example of this would be a
bicycle wheel hanging at one end
of its axle which if it were at rest
would fall due to gravity however
by possessing an angular velocity
this counter-intuitive
phenomenon known as
precession occurs first it is able to
stay in its original orientation
without falling and second it
begins to rotate around the
supporting point to understand
why precession occurs
let's take a closer look at what scale allowing the angular velocity
happens to the wheel respect to of the system to be known it's not
its supporting point the weight the most intuitive system in the
will generate a perpendicular world but that makes it even more
torque that would cause the impressive from a design
wheel to fall to the ground standpoint in addition these
however according to the second systems have one major limitation
law the torque will generate a since their operation originally
small change of angular depends on the moment of inertia
momentum in its direction which of the rotating disc which as I
in this case has no vertical mentioned at the beginning
component by adding the initial depends on the mass of the disc it
angular momentum with the is impossible to reduce the size of
small change due to the torque these systems without affecting
the resulting angular momentum their accuracy or rotation time but
and thus the wheel's axis of we had to start from something
rotation will have slightly changed the next type of gyroscope we will
its orientation horizontally discuss is the Coriolis effect
without falling due to gravity vibrating gyroscope this type of
moreover since it is always true gyroscope is one of the most
that the torque generated by the widely used nowadays as they can
weight will be perpendicular to be manufactured in really small
the angular momentum of the sizes at a low cost and therefore
wheel then the wheel will roll can be integrated into all kinds of
continuously forming a electronic devices such as your
circumference this relationship phones to understand the
between the torque applied to a principle of their operation, we
rotating object and the rotation must understand what Coriolis
resulting from precession is what acceleration is…
we can use to determine the
angular velocity of a system more Imagine a particle rotating around
specifically we can have a system a point at a constant angular
like this with a rotating disc at the velocity the particle's trajectory
center which in turn will be will form a circle with a radius r1
suspended by torsion bars these and the particle will have a
will allow the suspension tangential velocity of one now if
supporting the disc to rotate but that particle moves radially to a
will also impose a resistance that distance t2 the size of the circle
will increase proportionally to the defining its trajectory will increase
torque which means they allow us and therefore its tangential
to use the angle of torsion to velocity will also have to increase
calculate the applied torque to continue rotating at the same
similar to how springs allow us to angular velocity in other words if
use elongation to calculate the the tangential velocity increases
applied force this particular then there is an acceleration
system is made to detect which is known as Coriolis
movements in the z-axis if the acceleration in honour of its
central disk is rotating and the discover this acceleration by the
whole system is rotated about the way can be calculated as minus
z-axis the precession will generate two times the angular velocity of
a torque on the torsion bar and the particle multiplied by the
the frame will rotate slightly speed at which it moves radially
marking a value on a conversion values that we can then replace in
the classic formula of force equals
mass times acceleration thus if we
have a system in which we know
the value of the mass the velocity
perpendicular to the axis of
rotation and the applied force we
can calculate its angular velocity.
An example of a device with such
characteristics would look
something like this in this
configuration a mass is forced to
oscillate with a frequency of
several kilohertz because of this
when the system has been
rotated the oscillating mass will
experience a Coriolis force that
will move it to the left or to the
right depending on the direction
of the vibration and similar to
accelerometers this displacement
in turn can be used to calculate
the force experienced by the
mass so we would have all the
necessary elements to calculate
the angular velocity of the system
while the characteristics of these
gyroscopes make them ideal for a
large number of applications, they
have a disadvantage although
they are designed to measure
angular velocities linear
accelerations will also exert a
force on the oscillating mass and
therefore if the system is exposed
to large accelerations their
accuracy would be compromised
but fortunately, this is where the
third type of gyroscope we will
discuss comes in optical
gyroscopes which can detect
angular velocities completely
independently of the linear
accelerations of the system these
types of gyroscopes work on the
basis of the Sagnac effect.
Let's consider a ring composed of
Fiber optics and suppose that two
beams of light generated by a
laser propagate in opposite
directions inside the ring if the
system is static both beams will
travel around the perimeter of the
ring
in the same amount of time able to operate completely
however if the system is rotating without moving parts moreover
this will no longer be the case the despite the fact that in the
beam emitted in the same beginning they used to be of a
direction as the rotation of the large size due to their technical
system will have to travel a longer requirements nowadays this is no
distance before reaching the end longer a limitation since in 2018
of the path since the end point scientists at Caltech were able to
will basically be moving away build an optical gyroscope of just
from it on the contrary the beam two millimetres square.
traveling in the opposite direction
of the rotation of the system will
travel a shorter distance because
the end point will be getting closer
to it this difference in the distance
travelled by the light beams is the
key to calculating the angular
velocity of the system at this point
you may be wondering if a
variation in travel time was
already generated with each
beam individually then why do we
need two beams to calculate the
angular velocity the reason is that
since we are dealing with the
speed of light which remember
is approximately 300000
kilometres per second it would be
extremely difficult to make a
system precise enough to
accurately measure the time from
the time that light is emitted until
it reaches the end point since this
occurs virtually instantaneously
since light is an electromagnetic
wave with a certain frequency and
wavelength by having two beams
of light traveling in opposite
directions, they interfere with
each other generating a resulting
beam with new characteristics the
characteristics of this new beam
are related to the phase
difference between the beams
that produced it and therefore
to the difference in distances
travelled ultimately allowing us to
calculate the angular velocity this
type of gyroscope is not only
highly accurate but also quite
reliable because unlike the
previous ones it is