Paper 2, Section I, D
Part II, 2015
The Lagrangian for a heavy symmetric top of mass , pinned at a point that is a distance from the centre of mass, is
(a) Find all conserved quantities. In particular, show that , the spin of the top, is constant.
(b) Show that obeys the equation of motion
where the explicit form of should be determined.
(c) Determine the condition for uniform precession with no nutation, that is and const. For what values of does such uniform precession occur?