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Stability of Floating Bodies

A body can be stable even if its center of gravity is above the centroid, as with some floating bodies. When a body rotates, the centroid of the displaced liquid moves to a new location. If this new location is sufficiently far from the original, a restoring moment develops, making the body stable. The metacentric height, or distance between the center of gravity and the metacentre point, determines stability - a positive metacentric height means the body is stable, while a negative height means it is unstable.

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Isfak Ahmed
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165 views

Stability of Floating Bodies

A body can be stable even if its center of gravity is above the centroid, as with some floating bodies. When a body rotates, the centroid of the displaced liquid moves to a new location. If this new location is sufficiently far from the original, a restoring moment develops, making the body stable. The metacentric height, or distance between the center of gravity and the metacentre point, determines stability - a positive metacentric height means the body is stable, while a negative height means it is unstable.

Uploaded by

Isfak Ahmed
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Stability of Floating Bodies

If the center of gravity is below the centroid, the body is


always stable, as with submerged bodies.
The body may be stable, though, even if the center of gravity is
above the centroid, as sketched.

Stability of Floating Bodies


When the body rotates the centroid
of the volume of displaced liquid
moves to the new location C'. If the
centroid C' moves sufficiently far, a
restoring moment develops and the
body is stable.
This is determined by the metacentric height GM.
Metacentre M is the point of intersection of the buoyant force
before rotation with the buoyant force after rotation.
If GM is positive, as shown, the body is stable; if GM is
negative (M lies below G), the body is unstable.
2

Stability of Floating Bodies

To determine a quantitative relationship for the distance GM


consider the sketch, which shows the uniform cross section of
the floating body in rotated condition.
3

Stability of Floating Bodies


An expression for , the xcoordinate of the centroid of
the displaced volume can be
found by considering the
volume to be the original
volume plus the added
wedge with cross-sectional
area DOE minus the subtracted wedge with cross-sectional
area AOB.
To locate the centroid of the composite volume, we take
moments as follows:

Stability of Floating Bodies

Stability of Floating Bodies

Stability of Floating Bodies

Stability of Floating Bodies

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