PURE PHYSICS
If you’re a sheddie like me you will be torn between the desire to build, and the space to put your creations. One solution, of course, is to make things as gifts for family, friends, or work colleagues.
A perfect gift, which is often sold as an executive toy, but is equally suitable for anyone you know who has even a slight scientific bent, is a Newton’s cradle.
As most of you will no doubt be aware, and can easily see from the accompanying photographs, Newton’s cradle is a series of spheres suspended from a frame which at rest just touch each other. If one of the end spheres is pulled back and released to collide with the next sphere, the kinetic energy released should transfer to each sphere
