Jhula principle - increase speed by applying brakes.

[prajna]

Thanks Dingus.  Sorry I didn't notice it above the jpeg.

[prajna]

Dingus, that is a splendid machine.  Very simple and elegant.  I am a little confused about the rigid joint on the pendulum axle (the counterweight axle just stops it turning counter-clockwise, yes?)

It will be interesting to analyse and to fiddle with parameters.  Have you found that weights etc. are critical?

[Dingus Mungus]

Not really my design per say, just an improvement...
The original design was xnonix's and I was just fixing a bug I saw.

EDIT: Yes, the lock only prevents clockwise movement, and weights and such
are important as the device is pretty close to perfect mechanical resonance.
Definitely change stuff up though! We need to see this thing accelerate!
Thats the only way to extract anything useful from it...

Thanks again to xnonix for the original design.

~Dingus Mungus

[Dingus Mungus]

HA! About 20 minutes in to the sim the lever
falls out of its beat harmonic but gains energy!
Half hour run time has got me excited! 

[prajna]

Yup.  Not only that but you can change the weight of the pendulum and it still works.  I will have a play with pendulum length and the bracket length too and see what happens.

What you seem to have done with the spring is to bias the over-centre to one side; just what was needed.  I'll play some more.  Very exciting.