Dimensional analysis and intelligent experimentation

Author(s)

    • Palmer, Andrew C

Bibliographic Information

Dimensional analysis and intelligent experimentation

Andrew C Palmer

World Scientific, c2008

  • : pbk

Available at  / 5 libraries

Search this Book/Journal

Note

Includes bibliographical references

Description and Table of Contents

Description

Dimensional analysis is a magical way of finding useful results with almost no effort. It makes it possible to bring together the results of experiments and computations in a concise but exact form, so that they can be used efficiently and economically to make predictions. It takes advantage of the fact that phenomena go their way independently of the units we measure them with, because the units have nothing to do with the underlying physics. This simple idea turns out to be unexpectedly powerful.Students often fail to gain from dimensional analysis, because bad teaching has led them to suppose it cannot be used to derive new results, and can only confirm results that have been secured by some other route. That notion is false. This book demonstrates what can be done with dimensional analysis through a series of examples, starting with Pythagoras' theorem and the simple pendulum, and going on to a number of practical examples, many from the author's experience in ocean engineering. In parallel, the book explains the underlying theory, starting with Vaschy's elegant treatment, whilst avoiding unnecessary complexity. It also explores the use and misuse of models, which can be useful but can also be seriously misleading.

Table of Contents

  • Introduction and Motivation
  • Numbers and Units
  • Dimensions, Dimensionless Groups and Variables
  • Dimensional Analysis
  • Similarity and Intelligent Experimentation
  • Equations in Non-Dimensional Form
  • Models
  • Solutions to Problems.

by "Nielsen BookData"

Details

  • NCID
    BA87184380
  • ISBN
    • 9789812708182
    • 9789812708199
  • LCCN
    2008300929
  • Country Code
    us
  • Title Language Code
    eng
  • Text Language Code
    eng
  • Place of Publication
    New Jersey
  • Pages/Volumes
    x, 154 p.
  • Size
    24 cm
  • Classification
  • Subject Headings
Page Top