Abstract

Devices that produce curves by the rotation of circles (or gears) about one another constitute one class of harmonographs. In the simplest case, a point on one of the circles will trace a cycloidal curve. A number of devices of varying degrees of complexity and which make use of gears or pulleys in their operation have been invented over the years to draw various curves. This paper offers a survey of some of these.

Department(s)

Physics, Astronomy, and Materials Science

Document Type

Article

DOI

https://doi.org/10.1119/1.1309522

Rights Information

This article may be downloaded for personal use only. Any other use requires prior permission of the author and AIP Publishing. This article appeared in American Journal of Physics and may be found at https://doi.org/10.1119/1.1309522.

Publication Date

2-1-2001

Journal Title

American Journal of Physics

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