low-five, nailed it.
Joe - it was a few semesters for me as well, I could SWEAR he gave us the "balancing a wheel" story in class. Anyways I busted out my statics book so here's a formal definition:
"The radius of gyration is simply the length that, when squared and multiplied by the area, gives the moment of inertia about the axis. Thus, for example, I=Ak^2" where 'I' is the moment of inertia and 'k' is the radius of gyration.
(King, Mcgill. Engineering Mechanics, Statics. 4th ed.)
Of course that definition is WRT area. The same equation still applies for mass. That definition sucks really, just describes the equation in words lol
Joe - it was a few semesters for me as well, I could SWEAR he gave us the "balancing a wheel" story in class. Anyways I busted out my statics book so here's a formal definition:
"The radius of gyration is simply the length that, when squared and multiplied by the area, gives the moment of inertia about the axis. Thus, for example, I=Ak^2" where 'I' is the moment of inertia and 'k' is the radius of gyration.
(King, Mcgill. Engineering Mechanics, Statics. 4th ed.)
Of course that definition is WRT area. The same equation still applies for mass. That definition sucks really, just describes the equation in words lol