NavList:
A Community Devoted to the Preservation and Practice of Celestial Navigation and Other Methods of Traditional Wayfinding
From: David Pike
Date: 2019 Jan 26, 15:31 -0800
Even more thoughts on precession damping.
We seem to have this precession business cracked apart from explaining why the spin axis works its way back to the vertical again after being disturbed. Perhaps the bottom heaviness is a red herring and is there simply to ensure the gyro is reasonably close to upright when it starts to spin. If the gravity couple causes the gyro precess, then we must look for a torque or couple applied in such a way to make the gyro precess in such a way that the CG moves slowly back into line with the spin axis. Could it be differential aerodynamic effects on the spinning rotor, could it be the pivot walking around its cup in a circular motion of small radius? Still working on it. Tried to make gyroscope this evening but not very good. Just ordered a toy one from eBay. My head hurts. DaveP