Big try at gravity wheel

[mondrasek]

TinselKoala's videos already demonstrate that there is no gain in energy to be had by leveraging hydrostatic forces.

MarkE,

With all due respect, what does your statement above have to do with answering the questions I asked in the referenced post?

FWIW, I have asked several questions about TK's hydrostatic force demonstrations, both recent and in past, and not received any answer at all, or only oneliners like your own.

I don't mean to badger you, but I would like to know how you understand that the mathematical test I propose is, or is not, a valid test, and why.

What do my questions about the validity of a mathematical test have to do with any video where no maths were presented? 

Not that those demos were not great demos of and by themselves...

Thanks,

M.

[minnie]

     Sunset,
              how well has Fletcher summed things up in his reply at 823?
     We need facts so things can move on, yes it is, no it isn't doesn't
     get us anywhere,
                    John.

[MarkE]

So Archimedes Paradox has had me bothered when contemplating the operation of a ZED for some time.  I think I am close to a breakthrough on my mental block.  If you will consider:

Two columns of water, both 30 meters tall.  One column is in a pipe with an inner diameter of 1 meter.  The other is in a pipe with an inner diameter of 2 meters.  So the pressure of the water at the bottom of both columns is the same.  But obviously there is a greater volume of water in the pipe with the larger inner diameter.

If the pipes are filled from the bottom, does it take more work/energy to fill the pipe with the smaller or larger inner diameter?  I think it is clear that it would take more work/energy to pump the larger volume of water into the larger diameter pipe.  But on the upside of things, the work that can be performed by the water if allowed to leave the bottom of the column under pressure (and spin an electric generator via a turbine for example) is likewise greater in the pipe with the larger diameter.  Similarly, while the smaller diameter pipe takes less work/energy to fill, it can return less work/energy when draining again.  In short, the water in the smaller diameter pipe will have less PE than the water in the larger diameter pipe when both are filled to 30 meters.

The difference in PE can be shown in another way by plumbing them to a simple hydraulic cylinder as they drain.  Both pipes will cause that cylinder to begin moving with the same force which will drop to zero as the water level drops to zero, but the smaller pipe will move the hydraulic cylinder less far due to the smaller volume of water that it contains.  The integral of the force x distance (stroke of the hydraulic cylinder) is less.  This is to say the work it performs is less.  Or (stretching a bit here) the higher pressure for a shorter stroke relationship.

To get more out than in (work/energy) from a ZED I think it would need to be shown that the nested riser arrangement can produce an output integral of force x distance that is greater than the input force x distance.  Or not, of course.  One way to do that may be to fix an input pressure and volume (to simply comparisons) and then see if different proportions and layers of ZED construction will result in exactly the same output pressure/2 x stroke.  This (I think) can be calculated relatively easily.

Does this approach appear correct to anyone else?  Or incorrect for that matter?

Thanks,

M.

Mondrasek, I am sorry if I my replies have been too brief for you.
I hope that we agree that the volumes of the two pipes are respectively:  pi * 7.5 m^3 for the 1m diameter diameter pipe and pi * 30 m^3 for the 2m diameter pipe, a volume ratio of 4:1, ie the ratio of the cross-section areas.

I hope that we agree that the pressure at any height within each of the two pipes is identical.  Therefore if we were to connect the pipes they would naturally equalize to the same height.

From your statements above, it appears that you agree that the energy required to fill each pipe is the energy available to extract by emptying each pipe, and that the relative energy we can store as GPE of water in the larger pipe is four times that which we can store in the smaller pipe owing to the relative mass being 4:1 and the heights being the same.

I hope that it is also obvious that we will gain / lose identically four times the water height in the 1m pipe for each increment height we would lose / gain moving water from the wider pipe or to the wider pipe.  IOW, moving water between the pipes offers no gain or loss in total energy stored by the pair.

TinselKoala has recently relinked two of his videos done about two years ago.  In the latter video he dealt with Archimedes' Paradox, which really isn't much of a paradox at all.  In fact it is just Archimedes' Principle at work.  It is the very mechanism that Grimer took advantage of when measuring the volume of his concrete samples in that story he likes to tell.  In the video, TinselKoala had a flask that contained:  water, and another flask held down in the water by a rigid stand.   The larger flask with water in it was supported by a weigh scale, while the rigid stand was independently supported on the table.  TinselKoala showed that the weigh scale indicated 380g initially, and that after removing the larger flask and returning the water to its original height, the scale indicated 382g, a value within ~0.5% of the original.  IOW within experimental error, the upward force exerted by the water with the smaller flask inserted was identically the weight of the equivalent displaced water, even though as shown in the middle of the video the weight of the initial water volume + flask was only 200g.  Had the flasks been a tighter match even less initial water would have been needed.  Now if we go back to Grimer's story, his concrete object had an SG greater than 1 so he could hang it in his flask.  And as long as it did not touch the bottom, the effect of submerging it, just as TinselKoala submerged his flask was to displace an equivalent weight of water as the volume of the concrete sample.  In other words:  a fluid exerts a force against anything that displaces volume within the fluid equal to the weight of an equal volume of the fluid.  The paradox, which IMO is no paradox at all, is that the displaced volume: the "hole", can vastly exceed the volume of the fluid that surrounds the displaced volume.

The other video that TinselKoala linked showed that using a tube filled with air to connect to vessels of water under static conditions results in the water level being the same within each end of the tube that is submerged in each vessel.  That tube of air is equivalent to the air pockets that connect the various concentric cylinders in the ZED.

I hope this explains things for you.  But if it does not, by all means ask any questions you like and I will be happy to add to the explanations.

[TinselKoala]

@mond: here I will again bring up the Automatic Bollard, and my demonstration of the green liquid in the 4 tubes, driven by the single piston and the air pockets. In the bollard, a 'precharged' spring allows the operator to raise up and lower the bollard proper, which is a heavy steel structure weighing hundreds of pounds, by using only a few pounds of force. You put a spring in the hole and set the bollard body down onto it. The spring is not strong enough to hold up the entire weight of the bollard, so the bollard sinks. But it only takes a slight pull upwards to raise the bollard up, where it is locked in place. To release the bollard you just unlock it, and it sinks down under its own weight, perhaps slowed by a dashpot or other damper. How much work does it then take to raise this bollard weighing hundreds of pounds? Where does the work come from?

Much much less INPUT is required to achieve the result of a raised 200 pound bollard, due to the technology aiding Nature.
Right?

Or is some of the _input_ concealed from view, put in at the beginning on the initial compression of the spring and recycled over and over again as the bollard is raised and lowered with just a few pounds of external force?

[MarkE]

Webby you need to account for the pressure and volume in the different positions.  Once you do you will find that we really can reduce the analysis to an equivalent, and simpler construction.  However, even if you don't believe that, when you do take the pressure and volume in the different positions and do the algebra you will find that there is no energy gain.  Believe it or not the reasons for no energy gain have been very well understood for centuries.