The teaching laboratories of experimental physics, both at high school and at undergraduate level, do not usually address didactic experiments that include the measurement of the rolling friction coefficient. Indeed, the concept of rolling friction is systematically ignored in the collections of high school and even those of university education. In this paper we propose a low cost experiment using just an ordinary cylindrical battery, a smartphone camera and the free software Tracker for video analysis. Moreover, integrated into one didactical experience, one can measure two distinct physical quantities, namely kinetic and rolling friction coefficients. In fact, the video-analysis of the complete cylindrical battery movement, launched manually on a flat horizontal surface, allows splitting the movement in two parts: rolling with slip followed by rolling without slipping. The Tracker software has proven to be an efficient tool for obtaining measurements of the center of mass position and time in both phases of the movement. The experimental results allow very accurate and precise calculations of various theoretical parameters, in particular the two friction coefficients.
physics teaching; video analysis; rolling friction; kinetic friction; tracker
