IS Forum
Forum Index Register Members List Events Search Today's Posts Mark Forums Read Help

Go Back   International Skeptics Forum » General Topics » Science, Mathematics, Medicine, and Technology
 


Welcome to the International Skeptics Forum, where we discuss skepticism, critical thinking, the paranormal and science in a friendly but lively way. You are currently viewing the forum as a guest, which means you are missing out on discussing matters that are of interest to you. Please consider registering so you can gain full use of the forum features and interact with other Members. Registration is simple, fast and free! Click here to register today.
Reply
Old 5th February 2013, 11:28 AM   #1
Dancing David
Penultimate Amazing
 
Dancing David's Avatar
 
Join Date: Mar 2003
Location: central Illinois
Posts: 39,700
Gravity generator, perpetual motion

http://will.illinois.edu/news/spotst...soy-processor/

Quote:
Incobrasa Industries says the generator, designed by RAR Energy, an affiliated company in Porto Alegre, Brazil, will channel energy contained in the earth’s gravity, into “mechanical movement that is continuous and eternal”
__________________
I suspect you are a sandwich, metaphorically speaking. -Donn
And a shot rang out. Now Space is doing time... -Ben Burch
You built the toilet - don't complain when people crap in it. _Kid Eager
Never underestimate the power of the Random Number God. More of evolutionary history is His doing than people think. - Dinwar
Dancing David is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Old 5th February 2013, 11:54 AM   #2
Belz...
Fiend God
 
Belz...'s Avatar
 
Join Date: Oct 2005
Location: In a post-fact world
Posts: 96,875
Well, if we could harness gravity it would be as close to perpetual as you can get.

How we could do that, however, is left to the imagination, and I'm pretty sure that these guys don't have a clue, either.
__________________
Master of the Shining Darkness

"My views are nonsense. So what?" - BobTheCoward


Belz... is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Old 5th February 2013, 12:16 PM   #3
CynicalSkeptic
Master Poster
 
CynicalSkeptic's Avatar
 
Join Date: Oct 2006
Posts: 2,608
Oooh, they've applied for a patent, it must be legit.
CynicalSkeptic is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Old 5th February 2013, 12:32 PM   #4
Pulvinar
Graduate Poster
 
Join Date: Aug 2009
Posts: 1,501
Quote:
“mechanical movement that is continuous and eternal”
A satellite, maybe? (if you count the potential energy in the earth's gravity well)
Pulvinar is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Old 5th February 2013, 01:10 PM   #5
Soapy Sam
Penultimate Amazing
 
Join Date: Oct 2002
Posts: 28,766
"A Brazilian-based agribusiness company says its plant in the Iroquois town of Gilman will be home this coming fall to the first generator powered exclusively by gravity."

Surely any agribusiness plant would be powered by sunlight?
Soapy Sam is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Old 5th February 2013, 01:16 PM   #6
Gord_in_Toronto
Penultimate Amazing
 
Gord_in_Toronto's Avatar
 
Join Date: Jul 2006
Posts: 24,921
And when we have tapped this planet of all its gravity we will float off into space to find another planet deflate. I suggest Pandora.
__________________
"Reality is what's left when you cease to believe." Philip K. Dick
Gord_in_Toronto is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Old 5th February 2013, 01:17 PM   #7
ben m
Guest
 
Join Date: Jul 2006
Posts: 6,387
The article pulls quotes from an interview with Peter Sauer. I can sort of imagine how this interview actually went and was edited:

Interviewer: "Tell me about this technology."

"This sounds like a perpetual motion machine, which is impossible according to the laws of physics. These people are probably crackpots and should be ignored. These days, mostly you hear about perpetual motion from some sort of penny-stock swindler. Or maybe from amateurs who have misdiagnosed their own garage inventions. Like, some moron builds a wheel that spins for a long time, and thinks it's powering itself, but when you get into the details, you find out there’s a constant injection of energy at certain levels. Maybe they’re small, but over time, they’re not zero."

Interviewer: "But they say they're making 30 kW of electricity. Doesn't that change the world?"

"They're probably lying and you should say so in your article."

Interviewer. "Suppose it was real. What would it mean for global warming?"

"Not much. 30 kilowatts is down in the almost noise level of production."

Interviewer. "Really? If someone offered you a no-cost 30kW generator, how could that not be a good thing?"

"I really hope your article will make clear that these are probably scammers."

Interviewer: "I just need one quote on this, please."

"Fine, whatever. Forgetting about this Brazilian scam for a moment; energy is all about economics these days. If someone can demonstrate 30 kilowatts for free, that sounds like an interesting concept that we should hear about. Like, if you had an organic solar panel that was as cheap as a sheet of paper, that'd be interesting."
ben m is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Old 5th February 2013, 01:30 PM   #8
Jack by the hedge
Safely Ignored
 
Jack by the hedge's Avatar
 
Join Date: Oct 2009
Posts: 16,394
Originally Posted by Soapy Sam View Post
"... the first generator powered exclusively by gravity."
First except for every hydroelectric plant in the world.
Jack by the hedge is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Old 5th February 2013, 03:00 PM   #9
Ladewig
I lost an avatar bet.
 
Ladewig's Avatar
 
Join Date: Dec 2001
Posts: 28,781
Originally Posted by Gord_in_Toronto View Post
And when we have tapped this planet of all its gravity we will float off into space to find another planet deflate. I suggest Pandora.
Oh, please don't say that. I am not looking forward to hearing kooks rant about "peak gravity," the coming cataclysm, and how it is all being covered up by Big Gravity.
__________________
I lost an avatar bet to Doghouse Reilly.
Ladewig is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Old 5th February 2013, 03:43 PM   #10
TubbaBlubba
Knave of the Dudes
 
Join Date: Jul 2010
Posts: 12,936
Okay, let's see, if you utilize the potential energy of a gravity field, you can produce work, thereby reducing the potential energy of whatever you're utilizing it from.

This works up to a point. But at some point, you need to inject potential energy into the field in order to continue harvesting it.

So however the supposed machine works, all it does is convert some other form of energy into gravitational potential energy which is then harvested.

Am I missing anything?
__________________
"The president’s voracious sexual appetite is the elephant that the president rides around on each and every day while pretending that it doesn’t exist." - Bill O'Reilly et al., Killing Kennedy
TubbaBlubba is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Old 5th February 2013, 04:06 PM   #11
Soapy Sam
Penultimate Amazing
 
Join Date: Oct 2002
Posts: 28,766
No.
It's the cuckoo clock principle.

If they are using falling asteroids, that would be cool.
Then very hot.
Then cool again.
Soapy Sam is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Old 5th February 2013, 04:22 PM   #12
Andy_Ross
Penultimate Amazing
 
Andy_Ross's Avatar
 
Join Date: Jun 2010
Posts: 47,041
Originally Posted by Soapy Sam View Post
No.
It's the cuckoo clock principle.

If they are using falling asteroids, that would be cool.
Then very hot.
Then cool again.
and very intermittent.
Andy_Ross is online now   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Old 5th February 2013, 04:33 PM   #13
Brian-M
Daydreamer
 
Brian-M's Avatar
 
Join Date: Jul 2008
Posts: 8,044
Does anyone managed to find any information on how it's actually supposed to work? "By gravity" isn't much to go on.

It's strange that they'd take out a half-page newspaper ad to announce it, but in the local newspaper only, and not even bother to mention it on their website.
__________________
"That is just what you feel, that isn't reality." - hamelekim
Brian-M is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Old 5th February 2013, 05:10 PM   #14
catsmate
No longer the 1
 
catsmate's Avatar
 
Join Date: Apr 2007
Posts: 30,145
Originally Posted by Captain_Swoop View Post
and very intermittent.
How about tapping the kinetic energy of rainfall? Covering cities in giant domes with rain channels and small turbines?
__________________
As human right is always something given, it always in reality reduces to the right which men give, "concede," to each other. If the right to existence is conceded to new-born children, then they have the right; if it is not conceded to them, as was the case among the Spartans and ancient Romans, then they do not have it. For only society can give or concede it to them; they themselves cannot take it, or give it to themselves.
catsmate is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Old 5th February 2013, 05:28 PM   #15
dlorde
Philosopher
 
dlorde's Avatar
 
Join Date: Apr 2007
Posts: 6,864
Originally Posted by Ladewig View Post
Oh, please don't say that. I am not looking forward to hearing kooks rant about "peak gravity," the coming cataclysm, and how it is all being covered up by Big Gravity.
We're already past peak gravity. It's all uphill from here.
__________________
Simple probability tells us that we should expect coincidences, and simple psychology tells us that we'll remember the ones we notice...
dlorde is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Old 5th February 2013, 05:29 PM   #16
dlorde
Philosopher
 
dlorde's Avatar
 
Join Date: Apr 2007
Posts: 6,864
Originally Posted by catsmate1 View Post
How about tapping the kinetic energy of rainfall? Covering cities in giant domes with rain channels and small turbines?
It's just indirect solar power.
__________________
Simple probability tells us that we should expect coincidences, and simple psychology tells us that we'll remember the ones we notice...
dlorde is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Old 5th February 2013, 08:26 PM   #17
Myriad
The Clarity Is Devastating
 
Myriad's Avatar
 
Join Date: Nov 2006
Location: Betwixt
Posts: 20,891
If the people who claim to gain weight just by looking at a cinnamon bun are telling the truth, a perpetual gravity free energy machine should be quite simple. All I'd need would be two dozen of those people, a small ferris wheel, an opaque screen, a cinnamon bun, and a generator.

Respectfully,
Myriad
__________________
"*Except Myriad. Even Cthulhu would give him a pat on the head and an ice cream and send him to the movies while he ended the rest of the world." - Foster Zygote
Myriad is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Old 7th February 2013, 05:58 AM   #18
Dancing David
Penultimate Amazing
 
Dancing David's Avatar
 
Join Date: Mar 2003
Location: central Illinois
Posts: 39,700
Wow the gravo-cinnamonbun generator, ideal!
__________________
I suspect you are a sandwich, metaphorically speaking. -Donn
And a shot rang out. Now Space is doing time... -Ben Burch
You built the toilet - don't complain when people crap in it. _Kid Eager
Never underestimate the power of the Random Number God. More of evolutionary history is His doing than people think. - Dinwar
Dancing David is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Old 7th February 2013, 12:03 PM   #19
marting
Illuminator
 
marting's Avatar
 
Join Date: Sep 2003
Posts: 3,982
Using tidal water to generate power is certainly possible. The problem is the high cost of capital needed relative to the kwh produced. that's about as close as it gets to "gravity" based generator. Not quite perpetual though.
__________________
Flying's easy. Walking on water, now that's cool.
marting is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Old 7th February 2013, 01:16 PM   #20
Ziggurat
Penultimate Amazing
 
Ziggurat's Avatar
 
Join Date: Jun 2003
Posts: 56,425
Originally Posted by Myriad View Post
If the people who claim to gain weight just by looking at a cinnamon bun are telling the truth, a perpetual gravity free energy machine should be quite simple. All I'd need would be two dozen of those people, a small ferris wheel, an opaque screen, a cinnamon bun, and a generator.

Respectfully,
Myriad
Sounds a lot like this one:
YouTube Video This video is not hosted by the ISF. The ISF can not be held responsible for the suitability or legality of this material. By clicking the link below you agree to view content from an external website.
I AGREE

Stick around to the end, you'll be glad you did.
__________________
"As long as it is admitted that the law may be diverted from its true purpose -- that it may violate property instead of protecting it -- then everyone will want to participate in making the law, either to protect himself against plunder or to use it for plunder. Political questions will always be prejudicial, dominant, and all-absorbing. There will be fighting at the door of the Legislative Palace, and the struggle within will be no less furious." - Bastiat, The Law
Ziggurat is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Old 7th February 2013, 08:31 PM   #21
jasonpatterson
Philanthropic Misanthrope
 
Join Date: Apr 2009
Location: Space, The Final Frontier
Posts: 2,556
Originally Posted by ben m View Post
The article pulls quotes from an interview with Peter Sauer. I can sort of imagine how this interview actually went and was edited:

<snip>

when you get into the details, you find out there’s a constant injection of energy at certain levels. Maybe they’re small, but over time, they’re not zero."
My reading of the transcript was that the guy was saying exactly what you suggest he might have been. Essentially, every gravity driven machine has some outside energy input, so "quotation."
__________________
Sandra's seen a leprechaun, Eddie touched a troll, Laurie danced with witches once, Charlie found some goblins' gold.
Donald heard a mermaid sing, Susie spied an elf, But all the magic I have known I've had to make myself.
- Shel Silverstein
jasonpatterson is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Old 7th February 2013, 09:05 PM   #22
Gord_in_Toronto
Penultimate Amazing
 
Gord_in_Toronto's Avatar
 
Join Date: Jul 2006
Posts: 24,921
Originally Posted by Ziggurat View Post
Sounds a lot like this one:
YouTube Video This video is not hosted by the ISF. The ISF can not be held responsible for the suitability or legality of this material. By clicking the link below you agree to view content from an external website.
I AGREE

Stick around to the end, you'll be glad you did.
Thanks.

Too true. Too true.
__________________
"Reality is what's left when you cease to believe." Philip K. Dick
Gord_in_Toronto is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Old 8th February 2013, 01:17 AM   #23
fuelair
Banned
 
fuelair's Avatar
 
Join Date: May 2006
Posts: 58,581
Originally Posted by Dancing David View Post
No, it won't. Not now, not ever.
fuelair is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Old 8th February 2013, 01:24 AM   #24
fuelair
Banned
 
fuelair's Avatar
 
Join Date: May 2006
Posts: 58,581
And, for your edification and great delightenment I draw your attention to:The Museum of UnWorkable Devices!!! http://www.lhup.edu/~dsimanek/museum/unwork.htm
fuelair is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Old 8th February 2013, 02:13 AM   #25
GeneMachine
Critical Thinker
 
GeneMachine's Avatar
 
Join Date: Jul 2012
Posts: 332
Originally Posted by CynicalSkeptic View Post
Oooh, they've applied for a patent, it must be legit.
There actually are special classes in the International Patent Classifications system IPC for alleged perpetua mobilia. Class F03B 17/04 covers mechanical perpetua mobilia, H02K 53/00 covers electromagnetic ones.

Don't know if the link will work, these are the results for the mechanical ones at espacenet: F03B 17/04.

There is some nice crazy to be found there, if one is into that kind of thing...
GeneMachine is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Old 8th February 2013, 03:09 AM   #26
DC
Banned
 
Join Date: Mar 2008
Posts: 23,064
Originally Posted by Ziggurat View Post
Sounds a lot like this one:
YouTube Video This video is not hosted by the ISF. The ISF can not be held responsible for the suitability or legality of this material. By clicking the link below you agree to view content from an external website.
I AGREE

Stick around to the end, you'll be glad you did.
PETA is supressing this technology
DC is offline   Quote this post in a PM   Nominate this post for this month's language award Copy a direct link to this post Reply With Quote Back to Top
Reply

International Skeptics Forum » General Topics » Science, Mathematics, Medicine, and Technology

Thread Tools

Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

BB code is On
Smilies are On
[IMG] code is On
HTML code is Off
Forum Jump


All times are GMT -7. The time now is 03:16 AM.
Powered by vBulletin. Copyright ©2000 - 2024, Jelsoft Enterprises Ltd.

This forum began as part of the James Randi Education Foundation (JREF). However, the forum now exists as
an independent entity with no affiliation with or endorsement by the JREF, including the section in reference to "JREF" topics.

Disclaimer: Messages posted in the Forum are solely the opinion of their authors.