Report Title: Damped Oscillation

Name: Linton Ngobeni

Department of Physics and Astronomy,
University of the Western Cape
PHY222
For Dr Lucky Makhathini
Due Date: 1 September 2023

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Glossary of Terms
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Table of Contents

Glossary of Terms...........................................................................................................3
Table of Contents...........................................................................................................4
Abstract.........................................................................................................................5
Introduction...................................................................................................................6
Method..........................................................................................................................7
Results...........................................................................................................................8
Discussion......................................................................................................................9
Conclusion....................................................................................................................10
References....................................................................................................................11
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Abstract

A damping effect is one that reduces or stops oscillation in an oscillatory system by

affecting it internally or externally. Physical systems experience damping as a result of
processes that release the oscillation's stored energy.[1] Examples include viscous drag in
mechanical systems, resistance in electronic oscillators, and light absorption and scattering in
optical oscillators (a liquid's viscosity can inhibit an oscillatory system, causing it to slow down;
see viscous damping). Other oscillating systems, like those seen in biological systems and
bicycles, can benefit from damping that is not reliant on energy loss[2]. (For instance,
suspension (mechanics)). Contrary to friction, which acts on a system as a dissipative force.
Damping can result from or be caused by friction.
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Introduction

The decay of oscillations in a system following a disturbance is described by the

dimensionless quantity known as the damping ratio. When perturbed from their state of static
equilibrium, many systems display oscillatory behavior. For instance, a mass suspended from a
spring might bounce up and down if it is pulled and released. The system generally tries to
return to its equilibrium position after each bounce but overshoots it. When losses (such as
frictional ones) dampen the system, the oscillations may occasionally attenuate or progressively
decrease in magnitude. The oscillations' rate of decay between each bounce is measured by the
damping ratio. The system parameter zeta (zeta) stands for the damping ratio, which ranges
from being undamped (zeta = 0), underdamped (zeta = 1), to severely damped (zeta = 1).

A wide range of fields, including control engineering, chemical engineering, mechanical

engineering, structural engineering, and electrical engineering, are frequently interested in the
behavior of oscillating systems. An electric motor's speed or the sway of a tall building in the
wind are two examples of physical quantities that oscillate, however it might be useful to
describe common elements of behavior using a normalized or non-dimensionalized method.
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Method

In our case, we set up a string hook connected to a phone that has an application to record the
damping. We used water as our solution to add the damping effect on the mass connected to a
string.

Different oscillatory behaviors and speeds are displayed by a system depending on the amount
of damping that is present.The mass would fluctuate forever with identical height bounces in the
case where the spring-mass system is totally lossless.

We refer to this hypothetical situation as undamped. The spring-mass experiment would not
overrun if the system had large losses, such as if it were carried out in a viscous fluid. Instead,
the mass would gently return to its rest position. Overdamped describes this situation.The mass
frequently has a tendency to overrun its beginning point before returning and overshooting once
more.

The system loses some energy with each overshoot, which causes the oscillations to decay
towards zero. This situation is known as underdamped. There is a specific level of damping
between the cases of overdamped and underdamped damping.
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Results

A general representation of the exponentially damped sinusoid equation

is:

Y(t)=Ae-αtcos(шt-β)

●Where y(t) is the instantaneous amplitude at time t;

●A is the initial amplitude of the envelope;
●α is the decay rate, in the reciprocal of the time units of the
independent variable
●β is the phase angle at t = 0;
● ш is the angular frequency.

The damping ratio is a quantitative way to represent how much damping is

present in a system in comparison to critical damping.

Data ;
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Graphs:
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behavior of a weakly damped oscillator in displacement time, The times

when is either a positive maximum or a negative maximum are the values of t
that satisfy this equation

Discussion

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Conclusion

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References

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