Stepped Gradient Magnet Motor

[gyulasun]

The plastic box he has placed at the end of the stroke that the magnets on the arm collide with,, they hit it when the magnets are there and do not reach the box without,, the plastic box is what I am referring to as a "stop".

Just like with any magnet\pendulum setup there will be an increase in velocity as the magnet pulls in the magnet on the arm,, this with gravity will speed up the motion,, then when the magnet on the arm has passed over the magnet being used the magnet part will pull back on the magnet on the arm,, this happens like a rubber band and takes some distance to fully remove the added KE,, so if you place the box before that distance is reached it will hit the box, but can be further than the distance reached without the magnets.

Hi webby,

Okay, thanks.  I thought that the higher speed when the magnets are present comes from the "slingshot" effect NASA used to describe the gravity assist effect for rockets, see such description here: http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/mission/missiongravityassistprimer/ 
The trigates magnets I think give the 'slingshot' (i.e. magnet field assistance) to the pendulum when the movement is towards the left side to hit the box. This is a gain from the magnets because the distance the pendulum covers towards the left side is longer than without the magnets. This is what somehow could be developed further on.

Thanks,  Gyula

[Low-Q]

Hi Vidar,

Regarding the video I linked to, I did two screen captures as best as I could to see the highest swinging point for the pendulum on the right side, with the magnets and then without the magnets. Unfortunately, the camera angles are not exactly the same for the two cases but the camera height fortunately is more or less the same so the angle is not a drawback in this case to see how high the pendulum is able swing back on the right side: my estimation is that in both cases the height is 'almost' the same. 
I attached the two screen captures I did, probably an even better capture on the hights could be done with a video editor but I do not have such,  I made several captures to arrive at the two pictures below and I belive they show the highest points in both cases.

So I disagree with your statement I put in bold characters in your post quoted above.  If you disagree with the captures please make a better one which proves your sentence, maybe I missed the exact 00:00 video time where you see that. I saw the very nearly identical heights (which is the height of 6 CD plastic holders) at 0:38 and at 1:01.

Thanks for all your other explanations on the stepped gradient motor.

Gyula

You're welcome :-) Hope you got some perspectives to consider regarding the gradient stepped motor.


Regarding the pendulim: Have in mind that the designer would have put work into the pendulum in order to lift it into start position. How much work done here is not documented. If he used a scale we would have some clues what's going on. In devices in this small size it is almost impossible to feel the difference in force and energy. Replace the CD-covers with a scale and see what difference there is in the force. If the force is different, the designer spent more or less energy to lift the pendulum in the two examples.


Vidar