Building a clem engine using cooking oil.

[JimPghPA]

Originally Posted By: kschachn
Yeah but "lighter and lighter" would imply a whole different form of energy production...

Actually I think that most proponents of perpetual motion machines would say that the energy comes from a yet unknown "field" or source that the device is able to channel into useful work.

Originally Posted By: Astro14
Colder... Or lighter and lighter...


You mean we can put a man on the moon, but we can't build a machine that takes in heat energy from ambient on it own, and produces energy as mechanical rotational energy that has more power than we put into the machine? Aaahhhwww shucks.

 

[JimPghPA]

Years ago, I worked in Electronics, and my boss was an older man who was an outstanding electronic engineer. One day he told me a story about a project he worked on during WW2. They developed a high resolution TV camera that was suspended above a scale 3D map, so that when viewed the picture simulated flying over the area of the 3D map. The problem he had was that in order to get the high resolution, they had to do more lines and scan them faster. To do that they had to increase the grid voltage. He had done some calculations and was thinking that the camera tube would burn out in a few minutes if he ran the voltages he wanted to run, and back then camera tubes were not cheap. So he went and talked to the engineer who invented television, and asked him what he though regarding how long the camera tube would last if he increased the grid voltage. That man said that when he first designed the camera tube he did not think it would last long enough to be usable, but sometimes you just have to build it and see what you get. So he ran the camera tube with the higher grid voltage and instead of burning out in a few minutes, it burned out in about 24 hours. Apparently some of the calculations were not linear, he had thought that they were. Anyhow the U.S. Army-Aircore was happy with the system even though they had to put in a new camera tube about every 24 hours of use.

Moral of this true story, "Sometimes you have to build and see what you get."

 

[JimPghPA]

Originally Posted By: JimPghPA
Originally Posted By: kschachn
Yeah but "lighter and lighter" would imply a whole different form of energy production...

Actually I think that most proponents of perpetual motion machines would say that the energy comes from a yet unknown "field" or source that the device is able to channel into useful work.

Originally Posted By: Astro14
Colder... Or lighter and lighter...


You mean we can put a man on the moon, but we can't build a machine that takes in heat energy from ambient on it own, and produces energy as mechanical rotational energy that has more power than we put into the machine? Aaahhhwww shucks.


Lets connect about a million of those little mechanical birds that tip the bill into the water causing the liquid within them to cool, causing them to stand back up. And connect them to drive something like a generator.

 

[kschachn]

Originally Posted By: JimPghPA
Moral of this true story, "Sometimes you have to build and see what you get."


Even when it involves the second law of thermodynamics?

 

[JimPghPA]

Originally Posted By: kschachn
Originally Posted By: JimPghPA
Moral of this true story, "Sometimes you have to build and see what you get."


Even when it involves the second law of thermodynamics?


I know there is not free lunch when it comes to energy. But it is sometimes amazing to finally figure out where and or how things are going on.

Sometimes it seams that nature will bend over backwards to insure that no matter how hard you try to build a machine that defies the laws of thermodynamics, there is somewhere a gotcha where the whole thing says "Sorry Dave you can't do that."