THE SCIENCE AND APPLICATIONS OF ACOUSTICS - H. H. Arnold ...

72 4. Vibrating StringsFigure 4.1. History of the propagation of a disturbance in a stretched string.Dissipation of vibrational energy is neglected. We let x represent the coordinate ofa point along the horizontal distance with the origin at the left clamp of the string.The y-coordinate represents the transverse displacement from the equilibriumposition. As the transverse displacements are defined as being small, tension Tcan be considered nearly constant (T cos θ is even more so). Let θ denote the anglebetween a tangent to the string and the x-axis. In the segment of the string shownFigure 4.2. String element under the influence of tension force T .