Like a lot of these types of videos, I want them to be true.
However, my brain immediately starts screaming the there is something wrong here. And yes, the first thought I had was how precise those pieces of cardboard needed to be, mainly because of weight. also how hitting the center for the axle had to be absolutely precise to guarantee balance. (Precision I don't think you can get from cardboard.)

As far as the wight of lifting each of those flaps back up, I wouldn't think that the swinging flap would have enough energy to keep it going. Visually I see it happening in the video but I immediately question it. Again I want it to be true - think of the possibilities - but the skeptic in me tells me something else is at play here, even if I can't see it.

In reply to this comment by dannym3141:
Hi, don't know if you're satisfied about this video yet but;

If you accept purely gravitational motion, then the kinetic energy gained from lowering any individual card segment must be paid back in full when you raise it back up on the other side. Now factor in resistances (the pen cartridge axle, air resistance, and it's making noise which is a form of energy) and you quickly realise that for the whole thing to spin there must be an external application of energy.

Even consider how accurately he would have had to cut all those cardboard pieces to make them the exact same weight so that heavier ones didn't cause the contraption to slow. I can attest that i've made these types of things as a kid, as soon as you start building one you start to feel why it can't work; you can kinda feel the principle of conservation of energy yourself.

I have references if you need :
In reply to this comment by Sagemind:
Comments on YouTube claim that this is somehow fake - that there is a fan somehow blowing on it.

I see no fan in the one direction they show and his body blocks it from any wind on the other side while he is filming so..

Any takers...?

Like a lot of these types of videos, I want them to be true.
However, my brain immediately starts screaming the there is something wrong here. And yes, the first thought I had was how precise those pieces of cardboard needed to be, mainly because of weight. also how hitting the center for the axle had to be absolutely precise to guarantee balance. (Precision I don't think you can get from cardboard.)

As far as the wight of lifting each of those flaps back up, I wouldn't think that the swinging flap would have enough energy to keep it going. Visually I see it happening in the video but I immediately question it. Again I want it to be true - think of the possibilities - but the skeptic in me tells me something else is at play here, even if I can't see it.

In reply to this comment by dannym3141:
Hi, don't know if you're satisfied about this video yet but;

If you accept purely gravitational motion, then the kinetic energy gained from lowering any individual card segment must be paid back in full when you raise it back up on the other side. Now factor in resistances (the pen cartridge axle, air resistance, and it's making noise which is a form of energy) and you quickly realise that for the whole thing to spin there must be an external application of energy.

Even consider how accurately he would have had to cut all those cardboard pieces to make them the exact same weight so that heavier ones didn't cause the contraption to slow. I can attest that i've made these types of things as a kid, as soon as you start building one you start to feel why it can't work; you can kinda feel the principle of conservation of energy yourself.

I have references if you need :
In reply to this comment by Sagemind:
Comments on YouTube claim that this is somehow fake - that there is a fan somehow blowing on it.

I see no fan in the one direction they show and his body blocks it from any wind on the other side while he is filming so..

Any takers...?

Hi, don't know if you're satisfied about this video yet but;

If you accept purely gravitational motion, then the kinetic energy gained from lowering any individual card segment must be paid back in full when you raise it back up on the other side. Now factor in resistances (the pen cartridge axle, air resistance, and it's making noise which is a form of energy) and you quickly realise that for the whole thing to spin there must be an external application of energy.

Even consider how accurately he would have had to cut all those cardboard pieces to make them the exact same weight so that heavier ones didn't cause the contraption to slow. I can attest that i've made these types of things as a kid, as soon as you start building one you start to feel why it can't work; you can kinda feel the principle of conservation of energy yourself.

I have references if you need
In reply to this comment by Sagemind:
Comments on YouTube claim that this is somehow fake - that there is a fan somehow blowing on it.

I see no fan in the one direction they show and his body blocks it from any wind on the other side while he is filming so..

Any takers...?

>> ^Kalle:

One serious question that bothers me is.. why isnt it possible to use gravity as an energy source?
Would such a machine be a perpetual motion machine?

There is a bottom to a gravity well (apart from Black Holes? I don't know ). Say you drop an object and harvest some of its kinetic energy as it falls...what do you do once it reaches the bottom of the well? You must exert energy to pull it back out of the well, and that energy is greater than what you gained from dropping it. In a sense a pendulum makes this transaction with every swing. It does it very efficiently, only losing a fraction of its energy with each exchange but none the less it does lose energy. In a sense we never truly generate energy, we simply move it around. We break chemical bonds and withdraw a portion of the energy that was needed to make those bonds. Whenever we put an object with any mass on a high shelf we use some our energy and give it potential energy. Should it fall from the shelf this potential is converted to kinetic. The most plentiful supply of locked away energy? Probably mass. The speed of light squared is a big number, as GeesussFreek says, the future is probably fusion. If we can convert just a tiny fraction of this planets mass to energy cheaply and safely then our energy problems are more or less solved.

Anyway, I hope that somewhat answered your question. Its one of those questions that on the face of it seems simply to answer but once I tried I realised it wasn't so easy

To me this object looks like an extremely efficient pendulum. I actually love its design. The fact the ball "orbits" is actually very apt. I don't think its perpetual motion, but if it really had been going at near constant speed for that long then it is still a very impressive piece of engineering. He should patent and start making more. I'd bet people would pay a pretty sum for a scaled down version sitting on their desk. I would. Even better, put a lightbulb in the centre, surround it with 8 concentric rings for each planet and tweak the weights/magnets so the balls orbit at approximately the right speed...that would be fucking sweet.

>> ^Kalle:

One serious question that bothers me is.. why isnt it possible to use gravity as an energy source?
Would such a machine be a perpetual motion machine?


Gravity is REALLY weak. Like 36 orders of magnitude less than the electromagnetic force. 36 orders of magnitude is massive...larger the the total number of stars in the known universe. For instance, a fridge magnet is defeating the ENTIRE gravitational force of the earth AND the sun. Gravity makes for a great way to bind the macro-universe together, but it is shit as an energy source.

Also, gravity has only one polarity...and it doesn't turn off. So for the EM force, we have 2 poles that can be switched around via electrical current to make lots of different energy related things. But for gravity, you just have one ground state, and once you are there you need to input energy to get away from that ground state...no way around that. However, what has been done and is done in certain areas is to have a closed system where you apply energy at certain time and store that energy for later. The example most commonly used is in dams, where the will pump a large volume of water back up stream (potential energy) and store it (a gravity battery if you will) and release it as a later time when demand is high. This is always a loss based way to make energy; your going to spend more pumping it back up (heat loss and other losses including evaporation) than you will when you get it back...so it is just a way to cause demand shifting towards other hours with additional entropy.

You have 4 fundamental forces to draw energy from; and 3 of those are the only practical ones. Strong (nuclear) force, the EM force, and the gravitational force (the weak force is actually the force that powers the earths core, but isn't useful to use in power generation for a similar reason gravity isn't).

The EM force is what we use in internal combustion engines and electrical motors. Chemical reactions are rearrangements of the electron structures of molecules, which makes gasoline engines possible via liquid to gas expansion pressures. Generators deal with EM fields, polarity and current which is what drives thermal reactors like coal or can drive a car with a motor via conversation of stored electrical energy(just a backwards generator). Nuclear reactors deal with the strong (nuclear) force, and combine that with kinetic/thermodynamic forces of same flavor as coal and other thermal plants.

Even gravity isn't perpetual, the orbits of ALL celestial bodies are unstable. Gravity is thought and reasonably well satisfied to travel in waves. These waves cause turbulence in what would seem calm orbits, slowly breaking them down over time...drawing them closer and closer together. Eventually, all orbits will cause ejection or collision.


As to what energy is best, I personally believe in the power of the strong force, as does the sun . When you are talking about the 4 forces and their ability to make energy for us, the strong force is 6 orders of magnitude greater than other chemical reactions we can make. The EM force is not to much weaker than the strong force, but the practical application of chemical reactions limits us to the electron cloud, making fuels for chemical reactions less energetic by a million to a billion times vs strong force fuels. Now, only fission has been shown to work for energy production currently, but I doubt that will be true forever. If you want LOTS of energy without much waste, you want strong force energy, period. That and the weak force are the 2 prime movers of sustained life on this planet. While the chemistry is what is hard at work DOING life, the strong and weak force provide the energy to sustain that chemistry. Without it, there are no winds, there is no heat in the sky nor from the core, no EM shield from that core. Just a cold, lifeless hunk of metals and gases floating in the weak gravitational force.

Sorry for the rant, energy is my most favorite current subject



(edit, corrected some typos and bad grammar)

*promote

This is most likely the most AMAZING filament eruption to be caught on video. It is caused by a little process called magnetic reconnection. It's a little process that gives us our solar flares, these filaments, CMEs (Coronal Mass Ejections), auroras, and the possible potential for very dangerous radiation storms every few millennium--give or take a few. Basically, plasma flows along these field lines of magnetism. When things get out of hand, then those field lines distort and change and all of a sudden things get very dangerous (AND sometimes beautiful). The faster the magnetic field changes the faster the particles will travel making them more and more dangerous as the events unfold fast enough giving them more energy (kinetic & heat), which in turn if directed at us means it penetrates much further into our protective field and anything outside of the field, crispy--in the shredded DNA, cells, you name it sense.

Occasionally, Earth's magnetic field breaks down a bit (if I remember why correctly it was a certain "sequence" within our magnetic shield and it reacts badly with the Sun's--don't quote me though, I really need to look it back up again it was a very long time ago I remember this from), if a large solar flare directed towards Earth ever happened before Earth had enough time to fully build back it's strength we would be FAR more in trouble than usual, but this would be a rare event. Usually what happens is that the charged particles follow Earth's magnetic lines and go to the poles, which is the one place on Earth where you do suffer the most radiation from the Sun (basically wherever the poles are as the plasma follows the polarity or "field lines" of Earth's magnetic field). It's also why the closer you are to the poles the better your view is of the aurora as the particles streaming in, if there is a sufficient quantity moving very fast (the more energy, especially kinetic--speed, the farther the penetration into the atmosphere and the lower the aurora becomes visible), will enter the atmosphere and begin to be absorbed by various elements that our atmosphere is compromised of like Nitrogen.

Here's a quick explanation. Basically, the particles collide with atoms of molecules/elements or anything in the higher atmosphere, exciting their electrons into higher energy levels, which is known fundamentally in science as quantum leap/atomic transition/electron transition it's one of the atom's most fundamental abilities dealing with "extra energy" being pushed into a system that wants balance (this is a very common process that happens ALL DAY long, EVERYWHERE around you; it transfers photons essentially--pure energy--BUT, what is the energy in the form of as it's energy level makes it do very many different things; you could see things, what you consider the normal range of light--it's EXACTLY how light goes THROUGH a window--it doesn't go through the window it is transferred via the atoms from one side to the next, this is ALSO why people are trying to get invisibility to work as it just might; HEAT is another one that is transferred all the time--it literally radiates outwards from our bodies and then we are surrounded by excited electrons and the infrared range of light we are putting out, the heat of a human body...or any animal; this goes on and on, it happens everywhere and as I said ALL-THE-TIME, it's perhaps one of the most critical processes and abilities of the atom and how photons also transfer their energy between areas in a direction; a little off-topic information for those that don't realize how much is going on, everywhere, all the time, at any given second...it's a complicated, but beautiful world)), and making them give off light that we see when the charge they've taken on finally returns the molecule/element's electrons to their normal orbits in the electron shell; the color depends on what molecule/element was being bombarded and how much energy was involved from the particle that hit it). This of course transfers all the energy that those particles had and we get a nice light show.

/I thought I'd fill my promote with something useful; ...on why these happen...
//edit-For a little more clarity, grammar and a bit more information that I hope some will appreciate if it helps anyone learn something or atleast go look up some of this and learn some on their own; taking an interest in science, it's one of the most important things in the world that we have.
///Spreading science is just as important; it's the one literal thing we do/use that has ever allowed us to deal with the worst problems we have: fear, pain, death, disease, sorrow, despair, ignorance, etc... Science IS the light in the dark. It is our best hope for mankind's continued existence and a good life. It is the single most important activity we now do as a group; it's our savior from us and what's out there...

If I were facing an approaching wall of deadly kinetic energy I would like Black Sabbath's Into the Void playing. And I would like to spend that time with Bill Murray.

Thanks!

In reply to this comment by legacy0100:
*promote

I think ideally, as momentum must be conserved, that the ball would come in, the other ball would be ejected, and decelerated until it escaped the magnetic pull going the same speed as the incoming ball was before it started accelerating.

On a real physical track like this with friction and sound energy loss, I think the ball would be ejected, not overcome the pull of the magnet, and get sucked back pretty quick. It may strike hard enough to send the other ball out a bit, but after very few iterations, they would be all stuck together.

I haven't thought yet about the effect of the magnet moving towards the first ball as it approaches. Maybe this has no net effect at all.>> ^oritteropo:

Well it's only a guess, since I'm too lazy to do the calculations , but I don't think the kinetic energy from the impact would be sufficient to overcome the very large magnetic force, so click and no ball ejected.
>> ^messenger:
[...] Now I want to know what would happen if there was only one ball after the magnet. What do you think?

Well it's only a guess, since I'm too lazy to do the calculations , but I don't think the kinetic energy from the impact would be sufficient to overcome the very large magnetic force, so click and no ball ejected.
>> ^messenger:
[...] Now I want to know what would happen if there was only one ball after the magnet. What do you think?

>> ^shuac:
One question for you, Sarzy. You say this film is a milestone. I'm sure you're right. Can you tell me why this film is a milestone?


Because the fight choreography and direction are peerless; the film's fight scenes easily rival anything that I've ever seen, and I've seen my share of action movies.

Because the critical consensus is that it's an instant classic.

Because it's breaking through into the mainstream more than any martial arts film I can think of since Ong Bak.

Because it is awesome.

Some quotes from reviews:

David Fear -- Time Out: And in terms of beautifully coordinated film violence—the kind involving flying fists and feet, whizzing blades and ballistic superbattles—Gareth Evans’s insta-classic Indonesian crime flick is leagues above every kinetic bullet-ballet and martial arts epic of the past decade. Whether this 31-year-old Welsh director will eventually be mentioned in the same breath as legendary chaos orchestrators like Sam Peckinpah or John Woo remains to be seen. For now, Evans can take pride in the fact that he’s set the bar for cinemayhem impossibly high.

Andrew O'Hehir -- Salon: “The Raid” is a witty, pulse-pounding instant midnight classic, an immediate sensation at the Sundance and Toronto festivals that should appeal to cinema buffs, action freaks and a pretty large mainstream audience besides. It offers some of the best Asian martial-arts choreography of recent years and an electric, claustrophobic puzzle-palace atmosphere that’ll leave you wrung out and buzzed.

Ty Burr -- Boston Globe: Not yet 30, Evans is a master of visceral tension and release. “The Raid’’ repeatedly slows down, gathers force, and rushes forward using all the elements of filmmaking at a director’s disposal: editing’s ability to expand and contract time; the camera’s gift for revealing information through motion and light; a good musical score (by Joseph Trapanese and Linkin Park’s Mike Shinoda) that can cue audiences to respond or just play with their heads. At times, “The Raid’’ feels like pure cinema.

Nordling -- Ain't it Cool: Then, there are the action sequences, which are so exquisitely orchestrated that they build like a symphonic suite of pain and kickassocity. This movie builds and builds, each fight even bigger than the one before it. I can't imagine an audience that won't be on their feet for some of them - and the action choreography is damn near perfect, with cinematography to match. Sure, there's some shakycam, but it's only to build the intensity because Uwais and director Gareth Evans have planned each fight so well that it's never confusing, not once. The geography is flawless. The film wisely lays out the building early on, so that you unconsciously understand where everyone is in the building and even in the same room. I haven't seen such confident action direction since John Woo unleashed the doves in THE KILLER and, yeah, HARD BOILED.

kinetic energy is a bitch, yo!

>> ^Pring4:

According to the logo, this project has aspirations of sending these rails from the arctic circle to anywhere in the world. I support this.


Hate to burst your bubble, but at earth's surface escape velocity the kinetic energy of a projectile is only 32 times its weight in TNT. With suborbital flights and resistance on reentry the effect would be considerably less than that. Wind during the ascent would throw it off farther than the destruction radius unless the slug was really huge (multiple tons) or they put in some internal guidance system that can survive the biggest EMP ever.

>> ^TheGenk:

>> ^therealblankman:
Until the moment the universe stops expanding, or until the moment when monkeys fly out of my butt (whichever comes first of course) this will remain a pack of lies.

I'd say "lies" does not apply here since all the so-called PMMs in here, like the description more or less states are using an external source of energy: earths gravity.
So technically, they are not PMMs.
edit: Wait... I just destroyed my own argument... "lies" applies since they are not PMMs.

Hmmm... you might want to re-think the whole "Gravity being used as an external source of energy" thing. That's not what's happening here as gravity can not be used in such a sense. You can certainly use gravity as a way of converting potential energy into kinetic energy, but such energy is always quickly dissipated as heat. The classic example of this is having a mass at the top of a ramp and releasing that stored energy by allowing the mass to roll down that ramp. Once that mass reaches the bottom of the ramp, with perhaps a few oscillations until the energy is completely expended, then that's it- the "machine" comes to a complete halt and all the energy is spent. These machines in the video seek to return the mass to the top of the ramp over and over again without using outside energy to do so, and without losing any energy within the system itself, which is impossible.

The name of the piece is "Pony", and it's by Tim Lewis. There's a short blurb here - http://www.artnet.com/artwork/425478740/pony.html

I should've put "kinetic sculpture" into the tags.