The Chandler Wobble Period as a Check on Terrestrial Elasticity
Year: 2026
Type: article
Abstract: This study computes the Chandler wobble from stated inputs and places the result against both the published observational value and the density ceiling of Einstein-Cartan torsion gravity, in which spin-sourced torsion caps the effective density of neutron matter near 9.72e57 kilograms per cubic metre. The computation gives: rigid Euler period 304 days; observed Chandler period 433 days; lengthening factor 1.42; effective Love number inferred 0.28; independently measured Love number k2 0.30. The standard geophysical account reproduces the measured behaviour of the polar motion of the Earth within the uncertainty of its inputs, and the largest correction the ceiling could contribute at terrestrial densities is far below the precision of the observations, so the measurement is consistent with the frame while also naming the threshold at which it would cease to be. The wobble period is one of the oldest quantitative proofs that the Earth is not rigid: a single timing measurement, available since the eighteen nineties, already forces the elastic correction that satellite geodesy later measured directly, and the two routes agree within their uncertainties. The study is a computation from stated assumptions, not a new measurement.
Author: Aldred, William Alexander
Language: English
Subfield: Geophysics
Field: Earth and Planetary Sciences
Domain: Physical Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W7225771242
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