Here we consider only objects that roll smoothly along a surface; that is, the objects roll without slipping or bouncing on the surface. Figure 11-2 shows how complicated smooth rolling motion can be: Although the center of the object moves in a straight line parallel to the surface, a point on the rim certainly does not. However, we can study this motion by treating it as a combination of translation of the center of mass and rotation of the rest of the object around that center.
To see how we do this, pretend you are standing on a sidewalk watching the bicycle wheel of Fig. 11-3 as it rolls along a street. As shown, you see the center of mass O of the wheel move forward at constant speed vcom. The point P on the street where the wheel makes contact with the street surface also moves forward at speed vcom, so that P always remains directly below O.
Fig. 11-3 The center of mass O of a rolling wheel moves a distance s at velocity 
while the wheel rotates through angle θ. The point P at which the wheel makes contact with the surface over which the wheel rolls also moves a distance s.
During a time interval t, you see both O and P move forward by a distance s. The bicycle rider sees the wheel rotate through an angle θ about the center of the wheel, with the point of the wheel that was touching the street at the beginning of t moving through arc length s. Equation 10-17 relates the arc length s to the rotation angle θ:
where R is the radius of the wheel. The linear speed vcom of the center of the wheel (the center of mass of this uniform wheel) is ds/dt. The angular speed ω of the wheel about its center is dθ/dt. Thus, differentiating Eq. 11-1 with respect to time (with R held constant) gives us
Figure 11-4 shows that the rolling motion of a wheel is a combination of purely translational and purely rotational motions. Figure 11-4a shows the purely rotational motion (as if the rotation axis through the center were stationary): Every point on the wheel rotates about the center with angular speed ω. (This is the type of motion we considered in Chapter 10.) Every point on the outside edge of the wheel has linear speed vcom given by Eq. 11-2. Figure 11-4b shows the purely translational motion (as if the wheel did not rotate at all): Every point on the wheel moves to the right with speed vcom.
Fig. 11-4 Rolling motion of a wheel as a combination of purely rotational motion and purely translational motion. (a) The purely rotational motion: All points on the wheel move with the same angular speed ω. Points on the outside edge of the wheel all move with the same linear speed v = vcom. The linear velocities 
of two such points, at top (T) and bottom (P) of the wheel, are shown. (b) The purely translational motion: All points on the wheel move to the right with the same linear velocity . (c) The rolling motion of the wheel is the combination of (a) and (b).
The combination of Figs. 11-4a and 11-4b yields the actual rolling motion of the wheel, Fig. 11-4c. Note that in this combination of motions, the portion of the wheel at the bottom (at point P) is stationary and the portion at the top (at point T) is moving at speed 2vcom, faster than any other portion of the wheel. These results are demonstrated in Fig. 11-5, which is a time exposure of a rolling bicycle wheel. You can tell that the wheel is moving faster near its top than near its bottom because the spokes are more blurred at the top than at the bottom.
Fig. 11-5 A photograph of a rolling bicycle wheel. The spokes near the wheel’s top are more blurred than those near the bottom because the top ones are moving faster, as Fig. 11-4c shows.
The motion of any round body rolling smoothly over a surface can be separated into purely rotational and purely translational motions, as in Figs. 11-4a and 11-4b.
Rolling as Pure Rotation
Figure 11-6 suggests another way to look at the rolling motion of a wheel — namely, as pure rotation about an axis that always extends through the point where the wheel contacts the street as the wheel moves. We consider the rolling motion to be pure rotation about an axis passing through point P in Fig. 11-4c and perpendicular to the plane of the figure. The vectors in Fig. 11-6 then represent the instantaneous velocities of points on the rolling wheel.
Fig. 11-6 Rolling can be viewed as pure rotation, with angular speed ω, about an axis that always extends through P. The vectors show the instantaneous linear velocities of selected points on the rolling wheel. You can obtain the vectors by combining the translational and rotational motions as in Fig. 11-4.
Question: What angular speed about this new axis will a stationary observer assign to a rolling bicycle wheel?
Answer: The same ω that the rider assigns to the wheel as she or he observes it in pure rotation about an axis through its center of mass.
To verify this answer, let us use it to calculate the linear speed of the top of the rolling wheel from the point of view of a stationary observer. If we call the wheel’s radius R, the top is a distance 2R from the axis through P in Fig. 11-6, so the linear speed at the top should be (using Eq. 11-2)
vtop = (ω)(2R) = 2(ωR) = 2vcom,
in exact agreement with Fig. 11-4c. You can similarly verify the linear speeds shown for the portions of the wheel at points O and P in Fig. 11-4c.
CHECKPOINT 1 The rear wheel on a clown’s bicycle has twice the radius of the front wheel. (a) When the bicycle is moving, is the linear speed at the very top of the rear wheel greater than, less than, or the same as that of the very top of the front wheel? (b) Is the angular speed of the rear wheel greater than, less than, or the same as that of the front wheel?
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