• This short guide is about drawing a simple spring mass system in LaTeX using TikZ package. At the end of this tutorial, you will be able to fill shapes with patterns, create and customize a coil shape and position nodes using anchors! 

Table of Contents
Packages and Libraries
Step 1: draw the support
Step 2: draw the spring
Step 3: draw the mass
Spring Mass system LaTeX code
Extension of the spring Mass system

Packages and Libraries

The spring mass system that we would like to create in TikZ is shown below. Mainly, it has three parts: 1) the support, 2) the spring and 3) the mass.

Spring Mass system in TikZ

  • What packages and/or libraries are needed to draw a simple spring-mass system?

We need to load TikZ as it's the main drawing package. We need patterns which is a TikZ library for the support. In addition, we need to load decorations.pathmorphing which is also a TikZ library for drawing the spring!

Step 1: draw the support

The support corresponds to a rectangle shape filled with north west lines pattern.

Details: Let's consider a rectangle of 3cm width and 0.2cm height. The rectangle has no border and filled with north west lines pattern. We will add a thick line at the bottom side of the rectangle to get the following illustration: 

Supporting structure

and here is the corresponding LaTeX code:


\documentclass[border=0.2cm]{standalone}

% Required package and libraries
\usepackage{tikz}
\usetikzlibrary{decorations.pathmorphing,patterns}

\begin{document}
	
	
\begin{tikzpicture}[black!75,thick]

% Supporting structure
\fill [pattern = north west lines] (-1.5,0) rectangle ++(3,.2);
\draw[thick] (-1.5,0) -- ++(3,0);

\end{tikzpicture}

\end{document}

Step 2: draw the spring

As mentioned above, the spring can be drawn using decorations.pathmorphing library. Check the following line code which highlights different coil shape options:


\draw
[
	decoration={
		coil,
		segment length = 1mm,
		amplitude = 2mm,
		aspect = 0.5,
		post length = 3mm,
		pre length = 3mm},
	decorate] (0,0) -- ++(0,-2.5)

Coil options

Amplitude coil TikZ
Segment length coil TikZ
Aspect coil TikZ
Pre Post lines coil TikZ

Details: In our case, we will draw the coil from (0,0) to (0,-3) with the following parameters: 

- aspect=0.3, - segment length=1.2mm, - amplitude=2mm, - pre length=3mm,- post length=3mm

Here is the corresponding code:


\documentclass[border=0.2cm]{standalone}

% Required package and libraries
\usepackage{tikz}
\usetikzlibrary{decorations.pathmorphing,patterns}

\begin{document}
	
	
\begin{tikzpicture}[black!75,thick]

% Supporting structure
\fill [pattern = north west lines] (-1.5,0) rectangle ++(3,.2);
\draw[thick] (-1.5,0) -- ++(3,0);

% Spring 
\draw
[
	decoration={
		coil,
		aspect=0.3, 
		segment length=1.2mm, 
		amplitude=2mm, 
		pre length=3mm,
		post length=3mm},
	decorate
] (0,0) -- ++(0,-3) 
	node[midway,right=0.25cm,black]{$k$}; 

\end{tikzpicture}

\end{document}

Compiling this code yields: 

Draw a spring in TikZ

We have added a text node to the right of the middle point of the spring.

Step 3: draw the mass

The mass corresponds to a rectangle filled with yellow color and has a label m. We will draw it using rectangle node shape (more details). Here is the corresponding LaTeX code:


\documentclass[border=0.2cm]{standalone}

% Required package and libraries
\usepackage{tikz}
\usetikzlibrary{decorations.pathmorphing,patterns}

\begin{document}
	
	
\begin{tikzpicture}[black!75,thick]

% Supporting structure
\fill [pattern = north west lines] (-1.5,0) rectangle ++(3,.2);
\draw[thick] (-1.5,0) -- ++(3,0);

% Spring 
\draw
[
	decoration={
		coil,
		aspect=0.3, 
		segment length=1.2mm, 
		amplitude=2mm, 
		pre length=3mm,
		post length=3mm},
	decorate
] (0,0) -- ++(0,-3) 
	node[midway,right=0.25cm,black]{$k$}; 

% Mass
\node[draw,
	fill=yellow!60,
	minimum width=1cm,
	minimum height=0.75cm,
	anchor=north,
	label=east:$m$] at (0,-3) {};

\end{tikzpicture}

\end{document}

Compiling this code yields:

Simple mass spring in TikZ

Comments:

- The node by default has a rectangle shape that can be highlighted by adding draw option (draws the node shape border). 

-  fill=yellow!60: adds a light yellow color to the rectangle shape

- minimum width and minimum height sets the minimum size of the rectangle.

-anchor=north: by default the node center will be positioned on the provided coordinates (0,-3). Adding this option will position the top of the rectangle on the coordinates (0,-3). More details can be found in the tutorial: draw a rectangle in TikZ.

- label=east:$m$ : adds the text label $m$ on the right of the node shape. 

Spring Mass system LaTeX code

Here is the final LaTeX code of a simple spring mass system in TikZ. We have added arrows to the previous code and for more details you can check the post: TikZ arrows.

\documentclass[border=0.2cm]{standalone}

% Required package and libraries
\usepackage{tikz}
\usetikzlibrary{decorations.pathmorphing,patterns}

\begin{document}
	
	
\begin{tikzpicture}[black!75,thick]

% Supporting structure
\fill [pattern = north west lines] (-1.5,0) rectangle ++(3,.2);
\draw[thick] (-1.5,0) -- ++(3,0);

% Spring 
\draw
[
	decoration={
		coil,
		aspect=0.3, 
		segment length=1.2mm, 
		amplitude=2mm, 
		pre length=3mm,
		post length=3mm},
	decorate
] (0,0) -- ++(0,-3) 
	node[midway,right=0.25cm,black]{$k$}; 

% Mass
\node[draw,
	fill=yellow!60,
	minimum width=1cm,
	minimum height=0.75cm,
	anchor=north,
	label=east:$m$] at (0,-3) {};

% x1 arrow
\draw[very thick,
	red,
	|-latex] (-2,0) -- ++(0,-1)
	node[midway,left]{\small $x_1$};

% x2 arrow
\draw [very thick,
	blue,
	-latex
] (-0.8,-3.4) -- ++(-1,0) ++(0.25,0) -- ++ (0,-1)
	node[midway,left]{\small $x_2$};

\end{tikzpicture}

\end{document}
Spring Mass system in TikZ

View Image

TeX code

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Extension of the spring Mass system

  • At this level, you know how to draw a simple spring mass system. Copy and paste the above code inside a scope environment and and shift it to the right. Modify the shifted spring mass system as follows: 1) draw a longer coil, 2) increase the value of segment length of the coil, 3) change the size of the mass. That's it!

Extension of a coil spring Mass system in TikZ LaTeX

View Image

TeX code

Open in Overleaf

  • We've reached the end of this tutorial. If you have any questions or remarks, leave me a comment below or reach me via e-mail at admin@latexdraw.com, I will be happy to hear from you!

The post Spring Mass system in TikZ: Short Drawing Guide appeared first on TikZBlog.

See also: Original Source by Benmiloud Mohammed

Note: The copyright belongs to the blog author and the blog. For the license, please see the linked original source blog.