ME 246: Statics

Instructor: Honghui Yu

[email protected]
T-243
CHAP.1 INTRODUCTION

What is Mechanics?
Fundamental Concepts
Fundamental Principles
Systems of Units
Method of Problem Solution
Numerical Accuracy

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 WHAT IS MECHANICS?
 Mechanics describes and predicts the conditions of rest
or motion of bodies under the action of forces.

• Categories of Mechanics:
- Rigid bodies
- Statics (ME246)
- Dynamics (ME247)
- Deformable bodies, Mechanics of materials
Elasticity, Plasticity, wave propagation,….(ME330,
ME441, and graduate courses)
- Fluids (ME356 etc)
• Mechanics is an applied science - it is not an abstract
or pure science but does not have the empiricism
found in other engineering sciences.
• Mechanics is the foundation of most engineering sciences
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and is an indispensable prerequisite to their study.
 FUNDAMENTAL CONCEPTS
 Space - associated with the notion of the position of a point P given in
terms of three coordinates measured from a reference point or origin.

• Time - definition of an event requires specification of the time and

position at which it occurred.

• Mass - used to characterize and compare bodies, e.g., response to

earth’s gravitational attraction and resistance to changes in translational
motion.

• Force - represents the action of one body on another. A force is

characterized by its point of application, magnitude, and direction, i.e.,
a force is a vector quantity.

In Newtonian Mechanics, space, time, and mass are absolute concepts,

independent of each other. Force, however, is not independent of the
other three. The force acting on a body is related to the mass of the body 1 - 4
and the variation of its velocity with time.
 FUNDAMENTAL PRINCIPLES (6)
• Newton’s First Law: If the resultant force on a
particle is zero, the particle will remain at rest
or continue to move in a straight line.

• Newton’s Second Law: A particle will have

an acceleration proportional to a nonzero
resultant applied force.
• Parallelogram Law for  
sum of two vectors(forces) F  ma
• Newton’s Third Law: The forces of action and
reaction between two particles have the same
magnitude and line of action with opposite
sense.

• Newton’s Law of Gravitation: Two particles

• Principle of Transmissibility: are attracted with equal and opposite forces,
Mm GM 1 - 5
Statically equivalent F G 2
W  mg , g 
r R2
 SYSTEMS OF UNITS
• International System of Units (SI):
The basic units are length, time, and
• Kinetic Units: length, time, mass,
mass which are arbitrarily defined as
and force.
the meter (m), second (s), and
kilogram (kg). Force is the derived
• Three of the kinetic units, referred unit, F  ma
to as basic units, may be defined  m
arbitrarily. The fourth unit, referred  
1 N  1 kg 1 2 
 s 
to as a derived unit, must have a
definition compatible with • U.S. Customary Units:
Newton’s 2nd Law, The basic units are length, time, and
  force which are arbitrarily defined as
F  ma the foot (ft), second (s), and pound
(lb). Mass is the derived unit,
F
m
a
1 lb 1-6
1slug 
2
1 ft s2
Table 1.1
Table 1.2
Table 1.3
 METHOD OF PROBLEM SOLUTION
• Problem Statement: • Solution Check:
Includes given data, specification of - Test for errors in reasoning by
what is to be determined, and a figure verifying that the units of the
showing all quantities involved. computed results are correct,
- test for errors in computation by
• Free-Body Diagrams: substituting given data and computed
Create separate diagrams for each of results into previously unused
the bodies of interest with a clear equations based on the six principles,
indication of all forces or couple - always apply experience and
moment acting on each body. physical intuition to assess whether
results seem “reasonable”
• Fundamental Principles:
The six fundamental principles are applied to express
the conditions of rest or motion of each body. Among
these, the most important are the first and third
Newton’s law(for equilibrium). The rules of algebra are 1 - 10
applied to solve the equations for the unknown
quantities.
 NUMERICAL ACCURACY
• The accuracy of a solution depends on 1) accuracy of the given
data, and 2) accuracy of the computations performed. The solution
cannot be more accurate than the less accurate of these two.

• The use of hand calculators and computers generally makes the

accuracy of the computations much greater than the accuracy of the
data. Hence, the solution accuracy is usually limited by the data
accuracy.

• As a general rule for engineering problems, the data are seldom

known with an accuracy greater than 0.2%. Therefore, it is usually
appropriate to record parameters beginning with “1” with four digits
and with three digits in all other cases, i.e., 40.2 lb and 15.58 lb.

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