Engineering Mechanics

qModule 1: Basic Concepts

1.1 Introduction to Engineering Mechanics
 q Definition and applications of Mechanics
• Definition of Mechanics :
• The branch of physical science that deals with the state of rest or the
state of motion of bodies under the action of different forces is
termed as Mechanics .
• Application of laws of mechanics to field problems is termed
as Engineering Mechanics.
• Applications of Engineering Mechanics :
• It is used in design of all types of vehicles and design of all types of
structures.
• It is used for the analysis of robots, aircrafts, spacecrafts under the
action of different forces etc. .
 q Types of Mechanics subject
1. Classical mechanics/Newtonian mechanics
• The mechanics subject developed by Sir Isaac Newton related to the
study of rest and motion of objects under the action of forces is called
as Classical or Newtonian Mechanics.
• It is based on Newtons three laws of motion and the law of
gravitation.
2. Relativistic Mechanics
• Albert Einstein proved that Newtonian mechanics fails to explain the
behavior of high speed (speed of light) bodies.
• He put forth the theory of Relativistic Mechanics.
 q Types of Mechanics subject
3. Quantum Mechanics
• Schrödinger and Broglie showed that Newtonian mechanics fails to
explain the behavior of particles when atomic distances are
concerned.
• They put forth the theory of Quantum Mechanics.
 q Classification of Engineering Mechanics
• Depending upon the body to which the mechanics is applied, the
engineering mechanics is classified as
1. Mechanics of Solids and
2. Mechanics of Fluids
• The Mechanics of solids is further classified as
• Mechanics of rigid bodies and
• Mechanics of deformable bodies
 q Classification of Engineering Mechanics
• The body which will not deform or the body in which deformation can
be neglected in the analysis, are called as Rigid Bodies.
• The mechanics of the rigid bodies dealing with the bodies at rest is
termed as Statics and that dealing with bodies in motion is
called Dynamics.
• The dynamics dealing with the problems without referring to the
forces causing the motion of the body is termed as Kinematics and if
it deals with the forces causing motion also, is called Kinetics.
q Classification of Engineering Mechanics
 q Basic terminologies in mechanics
• Mass
• The quantity of the matter possessed by a body is called mass. Its unit
is kilogram and its symbol is kg .
• Time
• Time is the measure of succession of events. Its unit is second and
its symbol is s.
• Length
• It is a concept to measure distances. Its unit is meter and its symbol is
m.
 q Basic terminologies in mechanics
• Continuum
• A body consists of several matters. It is a well-known fact that each
particle can be subdivided into molecules, atoms and electrons. It is
not possible to solve any engineering problem by treating a body as a
conglomeration of such discrete particles.
• The body is assumed to consist of a continuous distribution of matter.
In other words, the body is treated as continuum.
 q Basic terminologies in mechanics
• Rigid Body
• A body is said to be rigid, if the relative positions of any two
particles in it do not change under the action of the forces.
 q Basic terminologies in mechanics
• Particle
• A particle may be defined as an object which has only mass and no
size.
• In dealing with problems involving distances considerably larger
compared to the size of the body, the body may be treated as
particle, without sacrificing accuracy.
• e.g. A ship in mid sea is a particle in the study of its relative motion
from a control tower.
• A bomber airplane is a particle for a gunner operating from the
ground.
 q Basic terminologies in mechanics
• Displacement (s)
• Displacement is defined as the distance moved by a body/particle in
the specified direction. Its unit is meter, m.
• Velocity (v)
• Velocity is rate of change of displacement with respect to time. It is
given by formula, v=ds/dt, where s is displacement & t is time. Its
unit is m/s.
• Acceleration (a)
• Acceleration is the rate of change of velocity with respect to time. It
is given by formula, a=dv/dt, where v is velocity & t is time. Its unit is
m/s2
 q Basic terminologies in mechanics
• Momentum
• The product of mass and velocity is called momentum. Thus,
Momentum = Mass × Velocity
• Its unit is kg-m/s.
 q Laws of mechanics
• The following are the fundamental laws of mechanics:
• Newton’s first law of motion
• Newton’s second law of motion
• Newton’s third law of motion
• Newton’s law of gravitation
• Law of transmissibility of forces
• Parallelogram law of forces
 q Laws of mechanics
• Newton’s First Law
• It states that every body continues in its state of rest or of uniform
motion in a straight line unless it is compelled by an external agency
acting on it.
• This leads to the definition of force as the external agency which
changes or tends to change the state of rest or uniform linear motion
of the body.
 q Laws of mechanics
• Newton’s Second Law
• It states that the rate of change of momentum of a body is directly
proportional to the impressed force and it takes place in the
direction of the force acting on it.
• Thus according to this law,
Force ∝ rate of change of momentum
But momentum = mass × velocity. As mass do not change, therefore
Force ∝ mass × rate of change of velocity
i.e., Force ∝ mass × acceleration
F∝m×a
 q Laws of mechanics
• Newton’s Third Law
• It states that for every action
there is an equal and opposite
reaction.
• Consider the two bodies in
contact with each other. Let one
body apply a force F on another.
According to this law the second
body develops a reactive force R
which is equal in magnitude to
force F and acts in the line same
as F but in the opposite direction.
 q Laws of mechanics
• Newton’s Law of Gravitation
• Every body attracts the other body due to gravitational pull.
• According to this law, the force of attraction between any two
bodies is directly proportional to product of their masses and
inversely proportional to the square of the distance between them.
• The force of attraction between the bodies of mass m1 and mass m2
at a distance d is given by

where G is the constant of proportionality and is known as

constant of gravitation.
 q Laws of mechanics
• Newton’s Law of Gravitation
 q Characteristics of a force
• A force is completely
specified only when
the following four
characteristics are
specified:
1. Magnitude
2. Point of application
3. Line of action
4. Direction
 q Characteristics of a force
• Unit of Force
• Force = mass x acceleration
• Therefore unit of Force is kg-m/s2 or Newton, N.
• From Newton’s first law, we defined the force as the agency which
tries to change state of rest or state of uniform motion of the body.
• From Newton’s second law of motion we came to know that 1
newton is the force required to produce an acceleration of 1 m/s2 in a
body of 1 kg mass.
 q Laws of mechanics
• Law of Transmissibility of Force
• According to this law the state of rest or
motion of the rigid body is unaltered if a
force acting on the body is replaced by
another force of the same magnitude and
direction but acting anywhere on the
body along the line of action of the
replaced force.
• This law is applicable only to rigid bodies.
 q Laws of mechanics
• Parallelogram Law of Forces
• This law states that if two forces
acting simultaneously on a body at a
point are represented in magnitude
and direction by the two adjacent
sides of a parallelogram, their
resultant is represented in
magnitude and direction by the
diagonal of the parallelogram which
passes through the point of
intersection of the two sides
representing the forces.
q Derived laws (From Parallelogram law of forces)
• Triangle Law of Forces
• If two forces acting on a
body are represented
one after another by the
sides of a triangle, their
resultant is represented
by the closing side of the
triangle taken from first
point to the last point.
 q Derived laws (From Triangle law of forces)
• Polygon law of forces
• It is stated as 'If a number of
concurrent forces acting
simultaneously on a body are
represented in magnitude and
direction by the sides of a
polygon, taken in an order,
then the resultant is
represented in magnitude and
direction by the closing side
of the polygon, taken from
first point to last point'.
 q System of forces
• When several forces act simultaneously on a body, they constitute a
system of forces.
q System of forces
 q Vector and Scalar Quantities
• Scalar quantity
• A quantity is said to be scalar if it is completely defined by its
magnitude alone.
• Examples of scalars are length, area, time and mass.
• Vector quantity
• A quantity is said to be vector if it is completely defined only when its
magnitude as well as direction are specified.
• Examples of vectors are displacement, velocity, acceleration, force,
momentum etc.
 q Idealizations in Engineering Mechanics
• A number of ideal conditions are assumed to exist while applying the
principles of mechanics to practical problems.
1. The body is rigid.
2. The body can be treated as continuum.
3. If the size of the body is small compared to other distances involved
in the problem, it may be treated as a particle.
4. If the area over which force is acting on a body is small compared to
the size of the body, it may be treated as a force acting at a point.
5. Support conditions are idealized (which will be discussed later) as
simple, hinged, fixed etc.
1.2 Resultant of System of
Coplanar Concurrent Forces
 q Composition of forces
• If all the forces in a system lie in a single plane and pass through a
single point, they constitute a coplanar concurrent force system.
• It is possible to find a single force which will have the same effect as
that of a number of forces acting. Such single force is called
Resultant force and the process of finding the resultant force is called
composition of forces.
 q Composition of two force system
• Consider the two forces F1 and F2 acting on a particle as shown in
Fig.(a). Let the angle between the two forces be θ. If parallelogram
ABCD is drawn as shown in Fig.(b), with AB representing F1 and AD
representing F2 to same scale, according to parallelogram law of
forces AC represents the resultant R. Drop perpendicular CE to AB.
q Composition of two force system
q Composition of two force system
• From the particular
cases 2 and 3, it is
clear that when the
forces acting on a
body are collinear,
their resultant is
equal to the
algebraic sum of
the forces.
• Problem : Two forces of 100 N and 150 N are acting simultaneously
at a point. What is the resultant of these two forces, if the angle
between them is 45°?
• Problem : Two forces act at an angle of 120°. The bigger force is of
40 N and the resultant is perpendicular to the smaller one. Find the
smaller force.
 q Resolution of forces
• The resolution of forces is exactly the opposite process of
composition of forces.
• It is the process of finding a number of component forces which will
have the same effect as the given single force.
 q Resolution of forces
• Resolution of a force into its
rectangular components
• If the force F makes angle θ with x-axis,
then the force F is resolved into its
rectangular components Fx and Fy.
• Its rectangular components in X and Y
directions are given by
Fx = F cos θ and Fy = F sin θ
• It should be noted that all component
forces act at the same point as the given
force.
 q General method of composition of
coplanar concurrent forces to find the resultant

• The method explained below can be used to determine the resultant

of any number of concurrent forces acting at a point in a plane:
• Step 1. Determine the component of each force in two mutually
perpendicular coordinate directions.
• Step 2. Add algebraically components of all the forces in each
coordinate direction to get two component forces.
• Step 3. The two component forces which are mutually perpendicular
can be combined to get the resultant.
 q General method of composition of coplanar
concurrent forces to find the resultant
• Let F1, F2, F3 and F4 shown in Fig. (a) be the system of four forces,
the resultant of which is to be determined.
 q General method of composition of
coplanar concurrent forces to find the resultant
• The procedure to be followed is as given below:
• Step 1. Find the component of all the forces in x and y directions.
Thus F1x, F2x, F3x, F4x, F1y, F2y, F3y, and F4y, are obtained.
• Step 2. Find the algebraic sum of the component forces in x and y
directions. ΣFx = F1x + F2x + F3x + F4x, ΣFy = F1y + F2y + F3y + F4y
• [Note: In the above example F2x, F3x, F3y and F4y are having negative
values.]
 q General method of composition
of coplanar concurrent forces to find the resultant
• Step 3. Now the system of forces is equal to two mutually
perpendicular forces, namely, ΣFx and ΣFy as shown in Fig. (b). Since
these two forces are at right angles to each other, the parallelogram
of forces becomes a rectangle.
• Problem : Determine the resultant of the three forces acting on a
hook as shown in Fig. (a).