Building a self looping "SMOT"

[JouleSeeker]

TK -- I await your reply.  Would also like to hear from MH and LibreE on this question -- the possibility of untapped or anomalous energy sources.

ICCF-18 - notice the subject of the conference, using the scientific method to study numerous reports of "anomalous heat" or energy.

I was there and gave a presentation.  Great conference.  Let me note here that Iwamura's claim of anomalous Cs to Pr transmutation (as deuterium gas passes through the cesium) has been replicated and confirmed by a Toyota team of scientists.  Their results were recently published in J-JAP (Japanese Journal of Applied Physics).

[LibreEnergia]

TK -- I await your reply.  Would also like to hear from MH and LibreE on this question -- the possibility of untapped or anomalous energy sources.

I don't doubt that there are untapped energy sources waiting to be found. Where there is plausible experimental evidence and or theory then there is likely something real happening and it should be investigated as far as possible.

LENR or whatever acronym is fashionable these days would definitely fall into that category for me. Barring outright fraud there seems to be enough experimental evidence to confirm it and some theories proposed seem plausible.

However I would draw the line at devices such as SMOTs and other magnetic or gravity based devices. We know enough about the EFFECT of gravity and magnetism to completely discount such devices ever working.

It is true that questions remain about what gravity and magnetism actually ARE and how the various forces are transmitted. 

If you were to propose a device that could alter the way space-time worked and offer a plausible explanation of how to achieve it then I certainly would not discount it out of hand. Barring that level of technology and understanding the chances of a SMOT working are precisely zero.

[TinselKoala]

And that is why, if there is energy gain as the object passes through the SMOT, we would consider that energy gain "anomalous".  But we cannot say in advance that there are NO untapped energy sources in nature to be uncovered -- do you agree we can not rule out novel (currently untapped) sources of energy?

Yes, I agree. My eyes are not yet so bad that I need the bold typeface though.

  From you earlier link:
At least he allows for the experimental possibility that the SMOT may "boost or increase energy of material objects passing through it."  Do you?

No, I do not. Magnetism and gravity and their interactions with ordinary matter are pretty darn well understood, and if you don't believe me, look up "Cassini mission" and explore the details of its navigation. Neither Gravity nor Magnetism is an energy _source_. And you, of all people on this thread, should know that much.

Unless you are saying that we now know EVERYTHING about Nature, no surprises left, no possibility of anomalous or untapped energy entering into the system...

Non sequitur.

[TinselKoala]

I don't doubt that there are untapped energy sources waiting to be found. Where there is plausible experimental evidence and or theory then there is likely something real happening and it should be investigated as far as possible.

LENR or whatever acronym is fashionable these days would definitely fall into that category for me. Barring outright fraud there seems to be enough experimental evidence to confirm it and some theories proposed seem plausible.

However I would draw the line at devices such as SMOTs and other magnetic or gravity based devices. We know enough about the EFFECT of gravity and magnetism to completely discount such devices ever working.

It is true that questions remain about what gravity and magnetism actually ARE and how the various forces are transmitted. 

If you were to propose a device that could alter the way space-time worked and offer a plausible explanation of how to achieve it then I certainly would not discount it out of hand. Barring that level of technology and understanding the chances of a SMOT working are precisely zero.

+++++ thumbs up.

(excluding Rossi and Defkalion from the "real" LENR research of course.)

[TinselKoala]

This makes me think of how to measure the speed of the ball.  Assume you don't use a camera and process video frames which is a hassle in itself.  Is there a system that anybody has come up with?  Perhaps it's already in the Arduino grab bag?

The first thing that comes to mind for me is an optical slot switch, connected an Arduino A/D converter, or perhaps a digital input, and some software.  There may be serious alignment issues with an optical slot switch, I am not sure.  Don't forget it's a ball and has a variable profile as you go off center.  Perhaps there are "smart" optical slot switches where the ball passes through a series of parallel IR beams and so the alignment issue is not a factor.

You could also do something like a guitar pickup.  It's also another op-amp project.  You take a relay coil and carefully remove the core.  Then you put a long and thin cylindrical magnet into the core.  You connect the relay coil to an op-amp configured as a comparitor.  Something very simple something like Conrad's circuit.  Then when the ball rolls past the relay coil the slight change in the permeability of the immediate surroundings will induce a voltage in the coil and trigger the comparitor.

So when the ball rolls past the sensor coil it should trigger the comparitor.  Obviously the faster the ball is moving the shorter the comparitor is triggered.  So you connect the comparitor output to an Arduino digital input, turn the crank, and the Arduino displays meters per second on the display.  You could easily use the hardware timer(s) built into the Arduino so that the software just has to read a count register, which makes life easier.  There is the issue of calibration, and probably still the issue of alignment, to be determined.  Even if it only made relative measurements, it would be a fun project.

It's a fun little challenge; how do you measure the speed of the ball in a cheap and reliable home-brew kid of way?

MileHigh

Optical sensing is the best, because there is no chance of perturbing the system this way. It is also simpler. Just a phototransistor and LED is all you need (the rest of the opamp circuit is of course also required, or Arduino can do it with almost no extra components). Optical triggers can be arranged to trigger on the rising or trailing edge of the shadow of the ball. As long as the mounting of the sensor is rigid and the ball isn't jumping up and down as it rolls thru the gate, there isn't any problem with consistent edge-triggering. Remember my vids demonstrating the optical trigger/delay system with the GenRad Strobotac? I'm not even looking at an opaque object, just water drops, and the system is precise. My arduino-controlled magnetic levitation apparatus also uses optical triggering on the edge of the shadow of the levitated object.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xkiGTWODERo