First published over 40 years ago, this work has achieved the status of a classic among introductory texts on mechanics. Den Hartog is known for his lively, discursive and often witty presentations of all the fundamental material of both statics and dynamics (and considerable more advanced material) in new, original ways that provide students with insights into mechanical relationships that other books do not always succeed in conveying. On the other hand, the work is so replete with engineering applications and actual design problems that it is as valuable as a reference to the practicing engineer as it is as a text or refresher for the general engineering student.
Mechanics is not a "heavy" book, despite the amount of material it covers and the clarity and exactness with which it treats this material. It is undoubtedly one of the most readable texts in the field. More than 550 drawings and diagrams in the regular text and in the highly praised 112-page section of problems and answers further contribute to its lucidity and value. The emphasis is consistently on illuminating fundamental principles and in showing how they are embodied in a high number of real engineering and design problems concerning trusses, loaded cables, beams, jacks, hoists, brakes, cantilevers, springs, balances, pendulums, projectiles, cranks, linkages, propellers, turbines, fly ball engine governors, hydraulic couplings, anti-roll devices, gyroscopes, and hundreds of other mechanical systems and devices.
Chapters cover Discrete Coplanar Forces, Conditions of Equilibrium, Distributed Forces, Trusses and Cables, Beams, Friction, Space Forces, The Method of Work, Kinematics of a Point, Dynamics of a Particle, Kinematics of Plane Motion, Moments of Inertia, Dynamics of Plane Motion, Work and Energy, Impulse and Momentum, Relative Motion, and Gyroscopes. Particularly in the last two chapters, Den Hartog provides advanced material not usual in introductory texts. "Very thoroughly recommended to all those anxious to improve their real understanding of the principles of mechanics." -- Mechanical World.
Index. List of equations. 334 problems, all with answers. Over 550 diagrams and drawings.
J. P. Den Hartog: The Reprint Engineer
J. P. Den Hartog (1901-1989), who taught for most of his career at MIT, was one of the founders of the Dover reprint program in engineering. As the author of several books that Dover reprinted and still has in print, and as an advisor from the 1950s until just a few years before his death in 1989, Professor Den Hartog gave invaluable advice concerning books of lasting interest and importance in his field.
Not many books in engineering have a productive shelf life spanning several decades. Among the exceptions are these four books of Professor Den Hartog, which Dover reprinted and occasionally revised in later printings from 1961 through 1987: Mechanics, 1961, Strength of Materials, 1961, Mechanical Vibrations, 1985, and Advanced Strength of Materials, 1987. Still widely read and cited by authors in these areas, Den Hartog's books are a tribute to his gift for exposition and clarity.
The J. P. Den Hartog Award, established in 1987, is presented in recognition of lifetime contributions to the teaching and practice of vibration engineering.
