Halliday, Resnick & Walker — Rotation: Problem Problem_82

George Washington Gale Ferris, Jr., a civil engineering graduate from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, built the original Ferris wheel for the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago. The wheel, an astounding engineering construction at the time, carried 36 wooden cars, each holding up to 60 passengers, around a circle 76 m in diameter. The cars were loaded 6 at a time, and once all 36 cars were full, the wheel made a complete rotation at constant angular speed in about 2 min. Estimate the amount of work that was required of the machinery to rotate the passengers alone.