The Road to Perpetual Motion

[neptune]

I have followed the posts of Hans for a long time. He has always appeared to me as a skilled knowlegeable man, who speaks his mind and does not tolerate any Bullshine. so to me it is interesting that he feels the need to put a name to the originator of this device. This to me suggests that Hans also has a poetic or artistic side, which to me makes him more human. More power to your elbow, Hans.

[Pirate88179]

@ Hans:

This is wonderful!  I wondered what you had been up to lately.  Once again, your research and your attention to detail have payed off.  This opens up an entire new line of thinking for me, and probably many others.  I have sketches of my original attempt at a "gravity" wheel from back in high school. (long, long time ago)  After much research, I found I had only been trying what others had for many years and failed to make work.

This approach is elegant in its basic simplicity.  Building it will obviously not be simple but the way you clearly explained its proposed operation is easily understood.  I wish I still owned my machine shop.

Just a quick thought on the torque restrictions you mentioned.  Obviously, for proof of concept a fairly small device would be manufactured to keep initial costs down but, and correct me if I am wrong, wouldn't increasing the basic OD (outside diameter) of the wheels give an inherent increase in torque?  Similar to a lever being twice as long as another lever?

With the permission you gave, I will go to your site an download all of this information.  If I can be of any help, just ask and I will see what I can do.

Thanks for sharing all of this.  These are the kinds of projects that are worth staying up all night pondering.

I wish you the best of luck with this idea.  Excellent!

Bill

[hansvonlieven]

G'day Bill,

Good to hear from you.

You are right, a longer travel of the weights would increase torque. In my animation and diagrams I stuck more or less with Pop Keenies dimensions. The short travel was, I imagine, decided upon for speed.

As I said earlier, a device of this nature should be built for torque, not speed.

I will in the prototype go way beyond Pop's layout. Higher speed brings enormous problems with centrifugal forces with it that I can do without. In order to increase torque we must lengthen the travel of the weights. What the optimum travel is I have yet to determine.

Keep well Bill,
Hans

[hydrocontrol]

As I said earlier, a device of this nature should be built for torque, not speed.
Hans

Seems that if you get one to unit work then simply adding additional units to the same output shaft would increase torque. Increasing weights should increase torque as well. If this ever works then I think a good apllication would be to run a generator because of the size involved but I bet it will create a lot of noise with all those weight clunking around..

[hansvonlieven]

@ hydrocontrol,

I don't know about the noise. Most of the noise emitted by machinery is caused by the controlled explosions that power it, The actual mechanical noise is very small by comparison. As to driving a generator, why does everybody always think of generators? Apart from a few applications, like computers and such, most electricity consumed is converted to mechanical motion. If you have a motor already, why would you convert the mechanical output to electricity (with all its attendant losses) and then convert back to mechanical energy with even more losses when you can drive the thing directly?

Take air conditioning, there you have an electric motor driving a compressor. So why not drive the compressor directly? It is the same with pumps. If the wheel can be built, and I think now that it can, much of existing technology will require a re-think.

Hans von Lieven