THE CONCEPT OF MOMENT:

Moment of force (or moment) is the tendency of a force to twist or rotate an object. This is an important, basic concept in engineering and physics. A moment is valued mathematically as the product of the force and the moment arm. The moment arm is the perpendicular distance from the point of rotation, to the line of action of the force. The moment may be thought of as a measure of the tendency of the force to cause rotation about an imaginary axis through a point. (Note: In mechanical and civil engineering, "moment" and "torque" have different meanings, while in physics they are synonyms.)


The moment of a force can be calculated about any point and not just the points in which the line of action of the force is perpendicular. Image A shows the components, the force F, and the moment arm, x when they are perpendicular to one another. When the force is not perpendicular to the point of interest, such as Point O in Images B and C, the magnitude of the Moment, M of a vector F about the point O is

where

is the vector from point O to the position where quantity F is applied.

× represents the cross product of the vectors.

[In the figure a moment at Point O, when the components are perpendicular to the Point O. Image B and Image C illustrate the components of a Moment at Point O, when the components are not perpendicular to point O.]

In mechanical engineering (unlike physics), the terms "torque" and "moment" are not interchangeable. "Moment" is the general term for the tendency of one or more applied forces to rotate an object about an axis (the concept which in physics is called torque). "Torque" is a special case of this: If the applied force vectors add to zero (i.e., their "resultant" is zero), then the forces are called a "couple" and their moment is called a "torque".
For example, a rotational force down a shaft, such as a turning screw-driver, forms a couple, so the resulting moment is called a "torque". By contrast, a lateral force on a beam produces a moment (called a bending moment), but since the net force is nonzero, this bending moment is not called a "torque".

A particle is located at position r relative to its axis of rotation. When a force F is applied to the particle, only the perpendicular component F⊥ produces a torque. This torque τ = r × F has magnitude τ = |r|  |F⊥| = |r| |F| sinθ and is directed outward from the page.

A Couple is a system of forces with a resultant (a.k.a. net, or sum) moment but no resultant force. Another term for a couple is a pure moment. Its effect is to create rotation without translation, or more generally without any acceleration of the centre of mass.

The resultant moment of a couple is called a torque. This is not to be confused with the term torque as it is used in physics, where it is merely a synonym of moment. Instead, torque is a special case of moment. Torque has special properties that moment does not have, in particular the property of being independent of reference point.

Simple Couple:

The simplest kind of couple consists of two equal and opposite forces whose lines of action do not coincide. This is called a "simple couple". The forces have a turning effect or moment called a torque about an axis which is normal to the plane of the forces. The SI unit for the torque of the couple is newton metre.
If the two forces are F and −F, then the magnitude of the torque is given by the following formula:

where

τ is the torque

F is the magnitude of one of the forces

d is the perpendicular distance between the forces, sometimes called the arm of the couple

The magnitude of the torque is always equal to Fd, with the direction of the torque given by the unit vector , which is perpendicular to the plane containing the two forces. When d is taken as a vector between the points of action of the forces, then the couple is the cross product of d and F.

  
Independence of reference point:

The moment of a force is only defined with respect to a certain point P (it is said to be the "moment about P"), and in general when P is changed, the moment changes. However, the moment (torque) of a couple is independent of the reference point P: Any point will give the same moment.In other words, a torque vector, unlike any other moment vector, is a "free vector". (This fact is called Varignon's Second Moment Theorem.)









The proof of this claim is as follows: Suppose there are a set of force vectors F₁, F₂, etc. that form a couple, with position vectors (about some origin P) r₁, r₂, etc., respectively. The moment about P is

Now we pick a new reference point P' that differs from P by the vector r. The new moment is

Now the distributive property of the cross product implies

However, the definition of a force couple means that

Therefore,

This proves that the moment is independent of reference point, which is proof that a couple is a free vector.