Stability of forced oscillations of a spherical pendulum

Abstract

The equations of motion for a lightly damped spherical pendulum that is subjected to harmonic excitation in a plane are approximated in the neighborhood of resonance by discarding terms of higher than the third order in the amplitude of motion. Steady-state solutions are sought in a four-dimensional phase space. It is found that: (a) planar harmonic motion is unstable over a major portion of the resonant peak, (b) non-planar harmonic motion is stable in a spectral neighborhood above resonance that overlaps neighborhoods of both stable and unstable planar motions, and (c) no stable, harmonic motions are possible in a finite neighborhood of the natural frequency. The spectral width of these neighborhoods is proportional to the two-thirds power of the amplitude of excitation. The steady-state motion in the last neighborhood is quasi-sinusoidal (at the forcing frequency) with slowly varying amplitude and phase. The waveform, as determined by an analog computer, is periodic but quite complex.