Wheel acceleration...

[Jon J Hutton]

Dr. What.

Sorry I forgot to tell you that you can only post a hidden message after a light blue post otherwise anyone can still see it. The font colors do not allow letters in light blue only white.

JJH

[jim_mich]

You can post in any color that you choose.




PS. The two background colors used here on the forum are color=#F8F8F8 and color=#F0F0F0.
PPS. I have no idea why anyone would want to hide messages.

[DrWhat]

OK, back to Wheel Acceleration;

Why does Wagner in his Critique say "vigorous push" (from John Collins at Free Enegy web site), yet most observers say "lightly with two fingers" or similar?

Stewart, John, any thoughts? Why the contradiction...

[mickegg]

Dr What

I suppose it would be "human nature" for Wagner to exaggerate the force needed if he was trying
to be negative about Bessler's wheel.

Regards

Mick

[bluesgtr44]

OK, back to Wheel Acceleration;

Why does Wagner in his Critique say "vigorous push" (from John Collins at Free Enegy web site), yet most observers say "lightly with two fingers" or similar?

Stewart, John, any thoughts? Why the contradiction...

I think Wagner was plucking at Bessler any way he could. I have read GB and Wagners critiques and the AP....the animosity between these two is quite apparent.

I also found where someone mentioned an acceleration time of "less than a minute"....I think it was for the Merseburg wheel. It was in the back of DT or AP where the letters are presented by witnesses. I'll try and find that and post it when I can....not at home now....work, work, work!


Steve

[Jon J Hutton]

Here is an interesting pendulum thought you would enjoy.

[John Collins]

Describing the visual experience of seeing a force applied to something is bound to be subjective and as both Mick and Steve have pointed out Wagner had an antagonistic view point.

It has always seemed to me that the description which uses the 'two fingers' comment was slightly odd; why not one finger? Was one finger really too weak to move something that could be more easily accelerated from a stand still with two fingers? I suspect that it was taken from Bessler's vivid demonstration of the wheel. I can imagine Bessler playing a theatrical role with relish and pointing out that he could set the wheel in motion with just two fingers of one hand.

To overcome the inertia of a stationary wheel would need quite a strong push. Remember that we are talking about the bi-directional wheel with possibly two sets of weights - weights that were so heavy that they had to be removed prior to translocation to allow the wheel to be lifted. We don't know how much the wheel with both sets of weights weighed but it was in the order of at least three hundred or more pounds in my opinion.

So it looks to me as though the 'two fingers' might have been necessary to overcome the inertia. Of course a long gentle push to allow acceleration might have been the answer and not a sudden energetic push to get the wheel to accelerate quickly. Maybe on some occasions the wheel was pushed harder than others, but Wagner might not have been exaggerating when he described the push as vigorous. It doesn't matter whose right really as long as the wheel accelerated away from its initial push which it did.

JC

[bluesgtr44]

I think whether it was a "vigorous push" or a "gentle nudge", is left to individual perspective....I don't remember seeing the tolerances of "vigorous" versus "gentle.....;-). They just did not get along and this was childish....

Hey Jon, sorry but I'm so behind on this board.....been sick and work has been demanding lately. I haven't downloaded the pendulum WM2D yet....but the graphs you posted looked like a lot of tight and fast oscillation going on....would that graph be for this pendulum device?

More than the 2 finger push or shove crap....what impressed me more was the description by Fischer (I could be wrong) that he was more impressed by how it took off and accelerated on its own, than if it had run a whole year....or something like that.....I couldn't agree with him more. If you had the where-with-all to inspect the bearings and such, and were pretty well sure that nothing outside the wheel was causing it.....it had to be from within and "yessireeee" that would have blown my socks off!


Steve

[John Collins]

Same here Steve - see my last sentence "It doesn't matter whose right really as long as the wheel accelerated away from its initial push which it did."

JC

[bluesgtr44]

That was what brought it to mind for me, John. He mentioned that if he just pushed a bit and let go, it would go back to it's original position.....he had to push it just enough to "activate" the system (my own interpretation) after which, he was obliged to use more force to stop it at anytime after that. Incredible!

It is this part, IMHO...that kind of reinforces the idea that the one way wheels were always OOB. Once the bi-directional wheel crossed that point.....more force was always required to stop it! I would make sense that a one directional wheel would/could need to be tied off.


Steve

[DrWhat]

Anyhow, two fingers is really edging close to the maximum force a hand can produce so I guess it doesn't say much. But I do believe that the pull (as stated above) had to be long enough to get the first weight to drop (or whatever acually happened).

[bluesgtr44]

Anyhow, two fingers is really edging close to the maximum force a hand can produce so I guess it doesn't say much. But I do believe that the pull (as stated above) had to be long enough to get the first weight to drop (or whatever acually happened).

I think it was just assumed that a weight was dropping....what if it was a whole weighted mechanism and one had to move it just enough for it to release from it's cradle.....and thus it would fall to that one side and create the off balance. The other one for the other direction would lock into the middle position and just be an inertial device with the rest of the wheel. Just a thought.......a bit out of the box.

[Stewart]

This a good example of what Bessler was up against with Wagner, and why he drove him to despair! Wagner would simply make things up. In GB the people who examined the Merseburg wheel testified that it was started with two fingers, and stressed the point that the force required was minimal. The author of GB also says the same and again stresses that very little force was required. However, Wagner states it required a powerful push! (the adjective he uses is 'gewaltig'). If Wagner were alive today I'd bet he'd be a 'journalist' for a tabloid newspaper.

Stewart

[Fletcher]

That was what brought it to mind for me, John. He mentioned that if he just pushed a bit and let go, it would go back to it's original position.....he had to push it just enough to "activate" the system (my own interpretation) after which, he was obliged to use more force to stop it at anytime after that. Incredible!

It is this part, IMHO...that kind of reinforces the idea that the one way wheels were always OOB. Once the bi-directional wheel crossed that point.....more force was always required to stop it! I would make sense that a one directional wheel would/could need to be tied off. Steve

Steve .. Just a point - I don't recall if Fischer said that a gentle push & it would return to its original position - I think he only said that with a gentle push its speed would augment until it was traveling at full rpm, & this persuaded him it was a true PM.

I think it was 'sGravesande writing to Newton about Fischer's letter & his own observations after having tested the two way wheel that said with a gentle push it would come immediately to a stop [not go back like an unbalanced device, as you might expect] - I'll find the letter reference & post it here.

The following translation was taken from Henry Dircks' book 'Perpetuum Mobile' (it also appears in John Collins' book 'Perpetual Motion: An Ancient Mystery Solved?') and is of the letter that 'sGravesande sent to Newton in August 1721. If anyone has a copy of the original letter, then please let me know.


SIR,—Doctor Desaguliers has doubtless shown you the letter that Baron Fischer wrote to him some time ago, about the wheel of Orfyreus; which the inventor affirms to be a perpetual motion. The landgrave, who is a lover of the sciences and fine arts, and neglects no opportunity to encourage the several discoveries and improvements that are presented him, was desirous of having this machine made known to the world, for the sake of public utility. To this end he engaged me to examine it; wishing that, if it should be found to answer the pretensions of the inventor, it might be made known to persons of greater abilities, who might deduce from it those services which are naturally to be expected from so singular an invention. You will not be displeased, I presume, with a circumstantial account of this examination; I transmit you therefore a detail of the most particular circumstances observable on an exterior view of a machine, concerning which the sentiments of most people are greatly divided, while almost all the mathematicians are against it. The majority maintain the impossibility of a perpetual motion, and hence it is that so little attention hath been paid to Orfyreus and his invention.

For my part, however, though I confess my abilities inferior to those of many who have given their demonstrations of this impossibility; yet I will communicate to you the real sentiments with which I entered on the examination of this machine. It is now more than seven years since I conceived I discovered the paralogism of those demonstrations, in that, though true in themselves, they were not applicable to all possible machines; and have ever since remained perfectly persuaded, it might be demonstrated that a perpetual motion involved no contradiction; it appearing to me that Leibnitz was wrong in laying down the impossibility of the perpetual motion as an axiom. Notwithstanding this persuasion, however, I was far from believing Orfyreus capable of making such a discovery, looking upon it as an invention not to be made (if ever) till after many other previous discoveries. But since I have examined the machine, it is impossible for me to express my surprise.

The inventor has a turn for mechanics, but is far from being a profound mathematician, and yet his machine hath something in it prodigiously astonishing, even tho' it should be an imposition. The following is a description of the external parts of the machine, the inside of which the inventor will not permit to be seen, lest any one should rob him of his secret. It is an hollow wheel, or kind of drum, about fourteen inches thick, and twelve feet diameter; being very light, as it consists of several cross pieces of wood framed together; the whole of which is covered over with canvas, to prevent the inside from being seen. Through the centre of this wheel or drum runs an axis of about six inches diameter, terminated at both ends by iron axes of about three-quarters of an inch diameter upon which the machine turns. I have examined these axes, and am firmly persuaded that nothing from without the wheel in the least contributes to its motion. When I turned it but gently, it always stood still as soon as I took away my hand; but when I gave it any tolerable degree of velocity, I was always obliged to stop it again by force; for when I let it go, it acquired in two or three turns its greatest velocity, after which it revolved for twenty-five or twenty-six times in a minute. This motion it preserved some time ago for two months, in an apartment of the castle: the door and windows of which were locked and sealed, so that there was no possibility of fraud. At the expiration of that term indeed his serene highness ordered the apartment to be opened, and the machine to be stopped, lest, as it was only a model, the parts might suffer by so much agitation. The landgrave being himself present on my examination of this machine, I took the liberty to ask him, as he had seen the inside of it, whether, after being in motion for a certain time, no alteration was made in the component parts; or whether none of those parts might be suspected of concealing some fraud: on which his serene highness assured me to the contrary, and that the machine was very simple.

You see, Sir, I have not had any absolute demonstration, that the principle of motion which is certainly within the wheel, is really a principle of perpetual motion; but at the same time it cannot be denied me that I have received very good reasons to think so, which is a strong presumption in favour of the inventor. The landgrave hath made Orfyreus a very handsome present, to be let into the secret of the machine, under an engagement nevertheless not to discover, or to make any use of it, before the inventor may procure a sufficient reward for making his discovery public.

I am very sensible, Sir, that it is in England only the arts and sciences are so generally cultivated as to afford any prospect of the inventor's acquiring a reward adequate to this discovery. He requires nothing more than the assurance of having it paid him in case his machine is found to be really a perpetual motion; and as he desires nothing more than this assurance till the construction of the machine be displayed and fairly examined, it cannot be expected he should submit to such examination before such assurance be given him. Now, Sir, as it would conduce to public utility, as well as to the advancement of science, to discover the reality or the fraud of this invention, I conceive the relation of the above circumstances could not fail of being acceptable. I am, &c.

This comment by 'sGravesande is intriguing for from the tone of the rest of the letter he was sincere & accurate with obvious high levels of observational skill - yet, he says "when I turned it but gently, it always stood still as soon as I took away my hand" - for a long time I wondered if his observational skills & memory had let him down & it really did roll back to its balanced position & that if the push was sufficient it got it over the threshold & then it could gain speed - but I don't think that 'sGravesand was remiss at all & it happened exactly as he says i.e. he pushes it gently & it moves in the direction of the push, then stops dead still [no back movement other than perhaps a bit of back torque rocking from the shaft & journal friction].

I would appreciate if anyone can provide any corroborating evidence of other witness accounts that mention anything about whether the wheel 'stood still' or 'moved backwards' after a very gentle push or controlled forced rotation of the wheel [with your hand still on it].

This, I think, is a very important bit of information because it is very hard to imagine a system [dual or otherwise] that doesn't have a balance position - mechanically solve that conundrum & answers might be a step closer to hand ?

[ovyyus]

You're right Fletcher...

...When I turned it but gently, it always stood still as soon as I took my hand away. But when I gave it any tolerable degree of velocity, I was always obliged to stop it again by force; for when I let it go, it acquired in two or three turns its greatest velocity, after which it revolved at twenty-five or twenty-six times a minute...' - letter from Willem Jacob 'sGravesande to Sir Isaac Newton, 1721.