Smot - A New Approach

[billmehess]

My very first posting on page one (which started this thread) shows that it is possible via the return tube concept to bring the ball back up to the exact height from which it was released.I did many many experiments to find this height and it is at 4" when the ball enters the tube it will cycle to the smot and back up the ramp. Look at the utube URL posted in my first post for the video.
The challange is that to achieve this 4" incline the smot ramp is a a fairly sharp angle. My uchannel is 6" long.
When the ball shoots up the ramp it is stopped at the end by the stickey point which is simply the magnetic field that the two sets of end magnets are creating.
It is held there with great force!! The problem is to get it past and down the tube. If this can be done the loop is closed!!
Having it strike another ball at the end will not push the ball past this point they will both simply "hang up" at the end.
It has been suggested that two additional sets of magnets in effect flared out at the end will pull the ball through. This will not work again the ball will simply hang up at the end.
I was successful in building a smot ramp with a hole about 75% up the ramp that the ball did fall through. The problem is that for the ball to fall through my "trap door" it was raised only very slightly only about 1" from the end. Again 4" is the magic number.
Also "if you "block  the field" at the end then the ball will not reach the end but stop before the end of the uchannel.

[gaby de wilde]

www.youtube.com/watch?v=f_dBH_YKVlI

The video does illustrate the idea nicely. :)You use up a lot of height to make the loop. The ball has to drop out of the smot quite vertically. The circular ramp should probably be more of finstrud's kind of design. He used 2 rings.

http://magnetmotor.go-here.nl/reidar-finsrud