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APS » Journals » Phys. Rev. Lett. » Volume 99 » Issue 15
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Phys. Rev. Lett. 99, 154302 (2007) [4 pages]

Coiling of Elastic Ropes

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M. Habibi1,2, N. M. Ribe3, and Daniel Bonn2,4
1Institute for Advanced Studies in Basic Sciences, Zanjan 45195-1159, Iran
2Laboratoire de Physique Statistique, École Normale Supérieure, 24, rue Lhomond, 75231 Paris Cedex 05, France
3Institut de Physique du Globe de Paris and Université de Paris-7, CNRS, Tour 14, 2, place Jussieu, 75005 Paris, France
4Van der Waals-Zeeman Institute, University of Amsterdam, Valckenierstraat 65, 1018 XE Amsterdam, the Netherlands

Received 13 April 2007; published 11 October 2007

A rope falling onto a solid surface typically forms a series of regular coils. Here, we study this phenomenon using laboratory experiments (with cotton threads and softened spaghetti) and an asymptotic “slender-rope” numerical model. The excellent agreement between the two with no adjustable parameters allows us to determine a complete phase diagram for elastic coiling comprising three basic regimes involving different force balances (elastic, gravitational, and inertial) together with resonant “whirling string” and “whirling shaft” eigenmodes in the inertial regime.

© 2007 The American Physical Society

URL:
http://link.aps.org/doi/10.1103/PhysRevLett.99.154302
DOI:
10.1103/PhysRevLett.99.154302
PACS:
46.32.+x, 46.70.Hg
 
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