Friction of bodies equals a quarter of the weight
Reckoning friction by balance-arms, with blocks dragged and bodies rolling
A densely written sheet stating Leonardo's law that every body resists in its friction with a force equal to a quarter of its weight, provided the motion is level and the surfaces are dense and polished. He sets out a detailed procedure for reckoning the counterweight of friction using the arms of a balance, multiplying, subtracting one, dividing and multiplying again by four, and observes that smoother and heavier bodies, and the varying sides of a body, behave differently in friction. A small balance-and-weight diagram sits at the top right, a dragged block lettered m and n distributes its load over eighths, and further figures sketch a research programme on rolling and falling bodies, accompanied by columns of calculation.
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Friction equals a quarter of a body's weight
Every body resists in its friction with a force equal to a quarter of its heaviness, the motion being level and the surfaces dense and polished. Leonardo proposes dividing the body's gravity into four equal parts, and the like for the arms of its balance, so that the powers of the movers and the frictions of the moved bodies may be more easily investigated.
Reckoning the counterweight of friction
Multiply the arm of the counterweight by four as many times as it contains the arm of the friction of the pivot, take away one, divide the friction of the pivot by the remainder, and multiply the result by four to obtain the counterweight. The subtracted one is the counterweight's own quarter of friction; the division serves only to find the denomination of the parts calculated.
Smoothness, weight and flexible surfaces in friction
Bodies of more polished surface have easier friction, and among equally slippery bodies the heavier resists more powerfully; a body of equal slipperiness but unequal sides does not change its resisting power whichever side is rubbed. But where the roughness is pliable, like cloth or cord, a particle laden with greater weight bends and flattens, so it no longer impedes the body dragged over it.
How a dragged block distributes its weight
A block four eighths long, two wide and one thick is dragged: the face n rests with 8/8 and the face m with 2/8, so that each eighth on one bears 4/8 and each eighth on the other bears 1/8. The letters m and n mark the two blocks in the figure.
Balance-and-weight apparatus for measuring friction
A small drawing at the top right shows a wheel or pulley with a hanging weight marked in quarters, the balance-arms apparatus referred to throughout the text for weighing the counterweight of friction against the force of the mover.
