Classical Mechanics: From Newton to Einstein: A Modern Introduction

This new edition of Classical Mechanics, aimed at undergraduate physics and engineering students, presents ina user-friendly style an authoritative approach to the complementary subjects of classical mechanics and relativity. The text starts with a careful look at Newton's Laws, before applying them in one dimension to oscillations and collisions. More advanced applications - including gravitational orbits and rigid body dynamics - are discussed after the limitations of Newton's inertial frames have been highlighted through an exposition of Einstein's Special Relativity. Examples given throughout are often unusual for an elementary text, but are made accessible to the reader through discussion and diagrams. Updates and additions for this new edition include: * New vector notation in Chapter 1 * An enhanced discussion of equilibria in Chapter 2 * A new section on a body falling a large distance towards a gravitational source in Chapter 2 * New sections in Chapter 8 on general rotation about a fixed principal axes, simple examples of principal axes and principal moments of inertia and kinetic energy of a body rotating about a fixed axis * New sections in chapter 9: Foucault pendulum and free rotation of a rigid body; the latter including the famous tennis racquet theorem * Enhanced chapter summaries at the end of each chapter * Novel problems with numerical answers A solutions manual is available at: www.wiley.com/go/mccall