As noted in the title, the thread is about transverse waves, not kinetic waves.
Vince,
I would disagree.
This topic is about "is the cast itself a transfer wave?". In the true Sexyloops tradition of a thread never staying on topic and taking 20 pages of discussion, the short answer is no, the loop wave results in points in the medium traveling in same direction as the propagation direction of the loop and therefore is not a transverse wave.
So if it is not a transverse wave, how would researchers in wave mechanics characterize it?
There is probably no agreement on what that answer might be, but in this paper on
The Propagation of Waves in a Cracking Whip Taft says:
When a whip is cracked, the user moves his or her arm back and forth, which
imparts energy on one end of the whip. This back and forth motion of the experimenter’s
arm creates a kinetic wave in the material. This wave propagates through the whip and
by the time it reaches the tip of the whip, that tip is moving at supersonic speeds.
Here is the shape of the wave he analyzed in his paper. You will note that it looks more like a fly casting loop wave rather than the tear shaped whip wave that Dr. McMillen studied in his thesis.
Thus if someone who is an expert in wave mechanics call that propagating loop shape a kinetic wave, I am more than happy to accept that the loop wave we produce in casting can rightly be considered to be an example of a kinetic wave.
Gordy
