Thought for the month
"There are decades where nothing happens; and there are weeks where decades happen"
Vladimir Ilyich Lenin. 1870 – 1924
Monday, 22 April 2013
Gloves off?
Much to Mrs Grange’s delight, Wales thrashed England at rugby last month. The rugby world may want to learn a bit of tribology, courtesy of Sheffield University who
have been measuring the dynamic friction between the ball, the skin and
the fingerless gloves or mitts that some players wear. Most rugby balls
are made with pimples on the surface to improve handling. In dry
conditions with no mitts, balls with more closely spaced pimples were
better for grip. But in wet or muddy conditions, the density of the
pimples allowed a film of moisture to form between them, so when wet, a
ball with wider pimple spacing is better. Synthetic leather mitts
produced the best performance across all conditions as the imposed
texture interlocked best with the pimples on the ball.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment