Dynamics of Maxwell’s pendulum

Abstract

The stability of motion of Maxwell’s pendulum is investigated in a uniform gravity field. By means of several canonic transforms of the equations of pendulum motion and the method of the surfaces of Poincaré sections, the problem is reduced to investigation of the immobile-point stability retaining the area of mapping of the plane into itself. In the space of dimensionless parameters, the stability and instability regions are singled out.