torsion balance

American  

noun

1. an instrument for measuring small forces, as electric attraction or repulsion, by determining the amount of torsion or twisting they cause in a slender wire or filament.

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torsion balance British  

noun

1. an instrument used to measure small forces, esp electric or magnetic forces, by the torsion they produce in a thin wire, thread, or rod

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Etymology

Origin of torsion balance

First recorded in 1820–30

Example Sentences

Their instrument is called a torsion balance: a metal disk with holes cut out of it hangs down from a fine wire, with a similar disk right below it that rotates at a constant rate.

From Scientific American

More than two centuries after Henry Cavendish devised a torsion balance to determine the constant of gravitation, metrologists have yet to agree on the constant’s precise value.Credit:

From Nature

By contrast, in the AAF method, two turntables are used to rotate the torsion balance and the external masses individually.

From Nature

To do so, he used a piece of apparatus called a torsion balance.

From Economist

Cavendish demonstrated this using a torsion balance, a horizontally suspended wooden rod with a small lead sphere at each end.

From Scientific American