Customer Reviews

Analytical Mechanics (Saunders Golden Sunburst Series)

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

This book contains 3rd year undergrad mechanics. Multivariable and differential calculus are definitely required. Some of the new math (more advanced calculus, such as tensors, variations, etc.) that is needed is covered in the book fairly well, but 2 years of calculus is absolutely necessary.

I thought the examples were pretty clear and most of the text helpful, minus the historical info (fluff). Most of the problems required abstract thinking from the text but didn't seem (and weren't) impossible, just difficult.

The topics covered in this book are the following: Vectors, Newtonian Mechanics, Oscillations (where it gets harder), Motion in 3-D, Noninertial Reference Systems, Gravitation, Dynamics of Particle Systems, Rigid Body Mechanics (2-D and 3-D), Lagrangian Mechanics, and Dynamics of Oscillating Systems.

Overall I would recommend this book. It would be a pretty good book for self-study, but a couple math suppliments on tensors and calculus of variations may be helpful (perhaps look at Dover Publications' books since they are cheap).

Having read the previous reviews of this book, I was surprised by the range of opinions and ratings. I personally think it is one of the best book on mechanics I have seen. In university (30 years ago) I used Marion, 2nd edition, and found it abstract and frustrating at times, with not enough examples. Over the years I have accumulated many more mechanics books to try and better understand the advanced concepts, none of which I found wholly satisfactory. What I like about this book is the wealth of worked examples (I am amazed by those that say there are not enough examples), which allow you to really understand the concepts, and the new topics like Chaos theory, which many mechanics books do not cover. Also, I like the MathCad examples, since I am a fanatical MathCad user. I agree that the problems are challenging, but that is what problems are supposed to be! A solution manual would be nice. After studying a book like this, you can finally approach a book like Goldstein!

This textbook covers all the aspects of analytical mechanics at the Junior/Senior level for an undergraduate physics major. It does this adequately. The organization of topics in the book appears to be slightly pell mell. The reader would benefit from the treatment of Langrangian mechanics before tackling the tough problem of 3D rigid body mechanics (the spinning top problem is much more approachable using the Lagrangian). The examples are slightly helpful, but leaving me wanting more. The problems are challenging. A solution's guide would be helpful to help the student work through some of the more difficult problems. In general the descriptions are clear, but as I said there does not seem to be a strong organiztional focus, which leads the reader to ask the question where are you going with this and why. It would have been nice to see clear motivating factors to want to study each chapter and to educate the reader why the topic is useful to study in more depth than in a introductory physics class. I cannot recommend a better book treating this subject but I would do an in-depth search for a better book on the subject before buying this one.

This is an excellent text. Much, much better than Marion and Thornton. It's not so advanced that you can't cover most of the material in one semester. The explanations are very clear and the layout is neat and conducive to learning. We used Marion and Thornton for class and I intensely disliked it. This is much better written and very well organised. I used it to study for the GRE. This is *the* undergraduate mechanic text!

I took a course in Analytical Mechanics my junior year and I found this book to be very advanced. If you touch up on your linear algebra, differential equations, and know a few tricks with Taylor series expansions and a few trig identitities, you should be armed with a decent arsenal for the exercises in this book. Exercises take a lot of time and energy, and examples provide little help. There are also supplementary sections which solve problems using Mathcad and Mathematica. These are helpful, but only if you've used the software before. The text wastes no time in teaching you syntax. Be prepared to expend extra energy re-reading sections of this book. It sometimes lacks clarity.

Many books discuss topics well and are good at providing an understanding at a very fundamental level with clear and rigid explanations, but lack the mathematical formalism for advanced study. Other books are far too cryptic and contain nothing but a sea of equations leaving the reader helpless when trying to figure out what came from where. This book is a very good mix of the two. I am about to finish a two semester sequence of Mechanics using this text and I find it does a very good job of explaining theory and ideas along with guiding you through the mathematics that make it all work.

Before this class I had three semesters of Calculus, one semester of Differential Equations, and a semester of Linear Algebra. With this background I found no difficulty whatsoever in interpreting the text, and most of the derivations are pretty straight forward.

There are a fair amount of worked out examples in each chapter, however, I recommend picking up a problem set book with full solutions. It's one thing to know which equations to use to solve a problem, but developing a keen problem-solving skillset requires looking over fully completed examples so that you can get a feel for the thought process.

This is an extraordinarily well written Mechanics book. I think that a first year college student may run into some difficulties with this, simply because he may not have yet acquired the mathematical sophistication to truly appreciate the elegance of the presentation. I do believe though that by the 3rd or 4th year of college, this should be a fairly easy read. I last studied college level physics about 17 years ago, and frankly regret not having access to a book like this at that point. This book has just the right size (less than 1/3rd the length of Taylor), doesn't go into unnecessary details that detract from the matter at hand, and from a mathematical point of view is just brilliant. For somebody seeking to self teach himself basic mechanics, this would be a god send. There are a very large number of problems, and for those who want even more problems, schaums problem compilations should be enough. The level of calculus required is elementary and the author does provide quick intro to tools that are needed, for example working definitions of curl etc. This book is really accessible to even a Ist year college student, with some minimal background preparation in calculus. Of course, if you don't know the derivative of a polynomial, this book may not be for you :)A solid book for the truly interested.

I would actually rate this book closer to 4 and 1/2 stars. I used this text for two semesters of mechanics as a Junior undergraduate physics major and found it to be well written and well organized. I found the historical introductions to the chapters to capture my interest and the material in the chapters to be thorough and logical. My only complaint of the text is that it doesn't offer more examples. I definately feel that most students with a introductory physics background could learn the principles of mechanics using this book without the help of an instructor.

This book does not have nearly enough solutions to end of chapter problems for a person to learn as much from this book as a person should from a book at this level. This is the only reason I gave just two stars instead of three or four. This book would benefit from more examples too. Examples and problems are essential to learning physics.

Besides the lack of answers to problems, this book is a little better than average. It is written with great clarity; it never leaves you lost or confused. I used this book for self-teaching. It works well for self-study but I would suggest supplementing this book by buying a book of worked problems or finding some on the internet.

This is a very good undergrad. book on mechanics. Pretty standard in its coverage: newton's laws, oscillating systems, rigid bodies, lagrangian dynamics. The problems are interesting and doable. The notation remains reasonable at this level (better than marion). The section on rigid body motion is better than most books although the section on lagrangian dynamics is less than average (relative to marion, which is great on this LD). There is a good deal of sample problems provided, which is always helpful. Be prepared to solve ODEs, expand functions and work in various coordinate systems. I would put this book in the 80th percentile of the ten or so books that I have studied on this topic.