So far we’ve disregarded damping on our harmonic oscillators, which is of course not very realistic. The main source of damping for a mass on a spring is due to drag of the mass when it moves through ...So far we’ve disregarded damping on our harmonic oscillators, which is of course not very realistic. The main source of damping for a mass on a spring is due to drag of the mass when it moves through air (or any fluid, either gas or liquid).