designtechnology
Levers
What is a lever?
A lever is made up of four parts: a beam, a load, an effort and a fulcrum (pivot point). There are three
classes of levers and we determine which class a lever is, depending on the arrangement of the
fulcrum, the load and the effort along the beam.
First class lever
This has the effort at one end of the beam, the load at the opposite end and the fulcrum is in the middle.
In the diagram, the load is pushing in an anticlockwise direction and the effort is pushing in a
clockwise direction around the fulcrum.
EFFORT
LOAD
FULCRUM
Second class lever
This has the effort at one end of the beam, the fulcrum at the opposite end and the load in the middle.
LOAD
EFFORT
FULCRUM
Third class lever
This has the load at one end of the beam, the fulcrum at the opposite and end and the effort in the middle.
LOAD
FULCRUM
EFFORT