"Orbo" from Steorn

[coylo]

I know there are a few threads on this already but I feel the need to start afresh....

http://www.steorn.com/

As you may know....."Orbo" is the name they've given to their new "magnetic energy generation technology".

They also state that...."It can be applied to power products ranging from portable music players to cars."
Which means that this technology (for the moment) is small scale. There is no mention that it could power your home, which would really make folk sit up and take notice! The only hope we inventors here have is that gravity based machines (once found...lol) are better (and cheaper) on a larger more heavy-duty scale than "orbo".

Steorn worries me, the developments I've made after 4 years research may be all in vain due to group who found this technology by accident.... they weren't even looking for it!

Life is so unfair!...moan.

Am I a selfish whinger.....or can others feel my pain?
Should I be glad that Orbo was found in the first place?

Steorn are stealin' my glory godammit! lol

[mickegg]

If it can be used to power a car I'd have thought that was quite significant.

However, let's wait and see

Oh, btw................................stop whinging! <grin>

Regards

Mick

[rlortie]

Coylo,

I am not the least bit worried about this Steorn thing!

So far all I have seen is a lot of promotional hub-hub with no substantial proof that they even have anything of value. You can check out all their links and find nothing showing a working device.

Even if their little magnetic device is capable of charging a cell phone battery over a lengthy time, it would be cost prohibitive to build one of any value. Rare earth magnets do not come cheap!

I can duplicate close to what they have shown with a piece of string, a paper clip and a cheap ceramic magnet from Radio shack. It is one of those old parlor tricks that were played back int the days before television kept a family entertained.

Many believe that the whole blow out is some sort of promotional advertising gimmick for there alleged company diversification. A lot of talk and more hot air than their pulse generator can produce.

Ralph

[Jon J Hutton]

I agree it could be a bunch of magnetized hot air Ralph.

I believe that when the Bessler Wheel hits the market (not lol) it will hit much harder than an expensive Orbo version. Just imagine what advantages a wheel that anyone anyplace could build with 17th century tools/materials would have over the orbo. Besides if you ran out of space to put the wheel farms you could start using lakes and oceans......I doubt Steorn could place theirs under water much less salt water. I believe in a universal force law that if it will work with magnets its just a matter of time (or perhaps already discovered:) before some discovery is made that will allow the same theory to work with other forces, like gravity. The gravity wheel will cause a bigger ripple/scientific embarrassment than a magnetic wheel because of its simplicity.

[coylo]

...."It can be applied to power products ranging from portable music players to cars."

I assumed that it was to power the car's electrical gizmos and not the car itself. If it can power a car's motion then I would agree that that is substantial indeed!

[Vic Hays]

It was reported that they had a fairly compact 500 horsepower prototype unit.

[coylo]

From an interesting (skeptical) thread, on the Steorn forums.....

Demagnetism and what Steorn left out

bobjones

So, what I never hear in this discussion is the reality of permanent magnets, they demagnetize!!! And they demagnetize even faster under a variety of conditions. My guess is that the "over-unity" effect Steorn is observing, is nothing but the release of demagnetism energy.

Alright, to better explain what I am saying, consider the equation for Helmholtz Free Energy (free energy in the thermodynamic sense, not in an over-unity sense).

A = U - TS where A is Helmholtz Free Energy, U is internal energy, T is temperature, and S is entropy.

Now for any magnet, the reason the atoms atoms align is because of the great internal energy advantage. However, this is at a cost of entropy (things don't like to be organized). This is seen in the equation above, as the magnet assumes its state (magnetized or demagnetized) because the atoms have found a balance between internal energy and entropy.

Any permanent magnet will demagnetize over time because there is a slight Helmholtz free energy advantage to being completely demagnetized, and having atoms in completely random alignment (entropy out weighs internal energy). Normally this is very very slow, because their is a large activation energy required for the atoms in a magnet to shift into an unorganized state.

However!!! When Steorn puts together their magnet set up, the activation energy for the reorganization of the atoms in the magnets is vastly lowered and so the magnets will demagnetize much faster!!! Further!!! I believe the "extra" energy Steorn is using in their prototype is simply the energy released as the magnet moves to a lower Helmholtz Free Energy state and demagnetizes!!!

Therefore, while Steorn's device will make some cool demonstrations, I believe the magnets will quickly demagnetize and the device will require new magnets to be put in. This would also means that the device is not "over-unity," it is just taking the energy from the magnet, energy that is in limited supply!!!!

Btw, creating magnets is an extremely energy expensive process ...

http://www.steorn.com/forum/comments.ph ... e=1#Item_0

[coylo]

The pints are on Sean as he throws a free bar for the selected scientists...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G5GrE-fikF4

....mines a guinness there Sean!

Johann Bessler gets a mention in this one, along with test rig footage.....
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BNDIWY19gqA

[jim_mich]

I'm sorry but permanent magnets do not de-magnetize with normal use! From my own personal 30 years of experience in the metal working industry I've observed that metal loves to become magnetic and hates to be demagnetized. I have a number of pieces of steel called "parallel bars" that are nothing more than hardened and ground pieces of steel used as spacers and such for use when clamping parts to a milling machine table. These pieces of steel refuse to stay demagnetized! Most machine shops have a device called a "demagnetizer" which is just a large electromagnet that oscillates the magnetic field back and forth. When pieces of steel are passed through this oscillating magnet field they loose their magnetism. Soon the steel become magnetic again and must be demagnetized again. This happens over and over.

I've never seen any experimental proof that permanent magnets loose strength with use over time (except when over heated). I think this is just theoretical number crunching. As a matter of fact it used to be quite common to place a "keeper" across the legs of horse shoe magnets to maintain their strength.

I can show you an experiment that demonstrates how magnets can gain strength. You will need one permanent magnet and one iron or steel bar about the same size as the magnet and one piece of straight wire cut from a large steel paper clip or small nail. Place the wire on a non-magnetic surface such as a table top and mark or note its location. Slide the magnet slowly toward the side of the wire until the wire jumps to the magnet. Now place the iron or steel bar against the either the back or the front end of the magnet and repeat the experiment. The magnetic strength will increase so that the wire jumps a longer distance. This shows that the magnetic field through the magnet increases when it is placed against a piece of non-magnetized steel. The magnet causes the steel to be magnetized and the magnetic strength is then the combined strength of the magnet and the steel.

If the magnetism is just stored energy within the permanent magnet then there should be no change in strength. But if magnetism is a spiral effect on Ether Energy as it passes through the magnet and the steel then it is the Ether Energy that provides the increased magnetism. The magnet is just a vortex helical shape that causes the Ether Energy flow to spin as it passes through the magnet. Ether Energy is what provides the energy of a magnet. The magnet just provides a spiral path that makes the Ether Energy spin. Think of a magnet as threads on a screw with Ether Energy flowing in both directions along the screw threads. The EE exiting one end will be spinning CW and the EE exiting the other end will be spinning CCW. A spinning vortex path is a longer path so the EE moves away from the magnet at a slower speed. When it encounters ferrous metals which have a similar EE resonate frequency then it causes unbalanced force and the non-spinning EE from the other side pushes the metal object. We call this magnetic attraction though it is actually EE repulsion. When the spinning vortex encounters a magnet the spin is either with or against the spiral path through the magnet. It either pushes against the spiral path or passes through with little resistance. As long as the spiral path remains intact there will be no reduction of magnetism over time or with repeated use.

Just as a magnet can cause increased magnetism in a nearby ferrous object it can also cause increased magnetism of nearby atoms within a same object. This is why my "parallel bars" keep becoming magnetized all on their own and I have a continual need to de-magnetize them.

So when skeptics say that permanent magnets demagnetize with use I don't think they know what the're talking about. Of course I could be wrong, but someone please show me data proving that permanent magnets demagnetize in normal use over time! I just don't see it happening in the real world.

[barksalot]

Jim.

In your experiment are you saying the magnets overall strength has got stronger or are you just redirecting the magnetic field and focusing it into a more narrow zone. Such as when you add reflector and director elements to a dipole antenna for radio reception or transmission. the dipole has not got stronger, only that the parasitic elements have distorted the field lobe in certain directions to be stronger and weaker.

Mike

[rlortie]

Having worked with and around magnets for 50 years, I agree with Jim's post above. Playing with various applications, I have devices with magnetic suspended bearings that have been under either repulsion or attraction for over a decade without any loss of strength.

Speaker doughnut shaped magnets are never symmetrical nor is the center hole round or in the right place. Years ago I learned that I could machine these ceramic magnets in my lathe using carbide tooling. This was done over 13 years ago and any ferrous metal placed in or on my lathe becomes covered with metal swarf! Cast iron chips being the worst. All tooling including hand tools laying in the tray have to be wiped down of magnetic residue before putting them back in their storage place.

Having purchased my bench mill after learning a lesson I cannot forget, I have been very careful about spreading this cancer to it.

If you believe that magnets loose their strength over time then sit and see how long it takes for one to fall off your refrigerator. Older magnets such as Alnico are more likely to loose their properties if left unused without a ferrous bar (keeper) attached to them.

Bottom line is: Working magnets retain and pass on their strength better than ones lying isolated and loose.

As for magnets being expensive I suggest some research into how our blacksmith forefathers made magnets. All it takes is a forge, anvil and hammer. You also need to know where true magnetic North is from where your anvil is facing.

By the way, a magnet attached to the side of your anvil helps deaden the ringing sound when struck with a hammer.

Magnets are very susceptible to temperature and high heat will kill them. A test for this, is to take two small doughnut magnets and drop them in a repelling mode over a pencil. Then stick the pencil into a cube of butter after measuring the distance between them. Let them cool for a while and then remove and measure again!

Some of the older members may remember when color TV first hit the market. It had a ring of magnets surrounding the cathode tube. A technician always carried a tool which was nothing more than a round coil that he would plug into the wall and swipe over the screen. This was called de-magnetizing or better known as degaussing. Later TV's came with a coil wrapped around the tube perimeter. This coil was activated for a short burst each time you turned the set on.

Ralph

[Thomas]

Jim,

My experience regarding magnets, are similar to yours. Although I was never a machinist, I spent enough time over the years working with them and visiting them in their shops to observe the same thing you are talking about. In regards to permanent magnets losing their magnetism while in use, I do have first hand experience with that. I once designed a mechanism that transferred mechanical motion through a barrier using a magnetic coupler. The rare earth magnets I used would begin to weaken, as the temperature in the machine would go up, but then go back to their normal strength when allowed to cool again. I some cases when the temperature went up too high, the magnetism was lost permanently. The various types of magnets, I worked with, had different tolerances toward heat and all would suffer permanent damage under extreme heat.

I have also observed that dropping a magnet seems to effect it's magnetic qualities, but I'm not sure to what extent. I never made any comparisons.

The one thing I've always been curious about is what happens when you force like poles on permanent magnets together for any length of time? Could close proximity of like poles for an extended period also have an effect on the strength of the magnets? I believe I've seen a couple of posts by members saying that clamping like poles together on magnets will cause them to lose some of their magnetic force. I always wanted to try this experiment but was not willing to risk damaging my expensive rare earth magnets. Perhaps a design with like poles constantly opposing each other is what some may think will cause the magnets to lose their magnetism.

Tom

[rlortie]

Thomas,

In response to your above post directed toward Jim, I cannot help but add my 2 cents worth! sorry.

I use "like poles repelling" mode all the time and have some that have been carrying a load for years. You can add weight to them up to the point that you only have a few thousands of an inch clearance and the properties never changes.

If the weight I am suspending is more than the magnets can support, I add another two magnets to the top. One is attached to the load and the other to a support. Now there are magnets on the bottom repelling and the ones on the top attracting. I have never found a loss of force in either mode.

Dropping a magnet can and will effect its gauss rate. To explain why, one must learn how ferrous metal magnets were first made without the use of electricity and or lodestone.

The excuse that repelling magnets go dead, will most likely be heard when someone announces a working magnetic motor that doesn't, and use the excuse that the magnets lost their power. Please send money for more powerful magnets!!!

Ralph

[jim_mich]

Mike,

The overall strength of a magnet gets stronger when you add a piece of iron or steel to the magnet. Or maybe the magnetism reaches out farther from the magnet? Whatever the case it has more pulling power at a greater distance when the magnet is made longer by adding a piece of steel or iron. The addition can be on either end of the magnet and the distance is the gap that the piece of wire jumps.

[Clarkie]

It is my understanding that if you continually 'pulse' a magnet it will lose its strength.

Pete.

Coylo, I thought you drank larger.