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            The following file refers to 'A Perpetual Motion Idea'.
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From: nazrael@cats.ucsc.edu (James Vanmeter)
Newsgroups: alt.sci.physics.new-theories
Subject: Yet another idea for a perpetual motion machine...
Date: 4 Jul 1994 03:33:58 GMT
Organization: University of California; Santa Cruz
Lines: 116
Message-ID: <2v7vv6$p93@darkstar.UCSC.EDU>
NNTP-Posting-Host: si.ucsc.edu

An idea for a perpetual motion machine was recently presented to me and I
can't find the flaw in it.  It makes use of the Meissner effect and the fact
that magnetic fields propagate at finite velocity.

Imagine a bar magnet with an axle through its center, that is, in between the
north and south poles.  It is free to spin on its axle and is somehow mounted
within and coaxial to a superconducting cylinder.

The cross-sectional view looks like something like this:

                            ***
                        *         *
                       *    |S|    *
                       *    |+|    *
                       *    |N|    *
                        *         *
                            ***

except that the asterisks, representing the cylinder wall, are supposed to
form a complete circle.  Also, the radius of the cylinder is preferrably quite
large, for reasons that will soon be made clear.

Now the superconducting cylinder reflects the magnetic field of the bar
magnet.  Each pole of the magnet "sees" its reflected image in the cylinder
wall, in effect creating virtual magnets:

                            |N|
                            | |
                            |S|

                            ***
                        *         *
                       *    |S|    *
                       *    |+|    *
                       *    |N|    *
                        *         *
                            ***

                            |N|
                            | |
                            |S|

(There would of course be virtual magnets all along the circumferrence, or
equivalently one big cylindrical magnet with orientation opposite that of the
bar magnet.  But the above simplification seems good enough for purposes of
illustration.)

If we give the real magnet a spin, then the virtual magnets orbit it.  If the
magnetic fields propagated instantaneously, then the orbit of the virtual
magnets would be in perfect synchrony with the spin of the real magnet, they
would always be perfectly opposed as shown above, and the net effect on the
real magnet would be nil.  Thus the magnet would spin freely until friction on
its axle eventually brought it to a halt.

However the fields do not propagate instantaneously.  The spinning magnet will
rotate a bit before it receives its reflection -- a magnetic image of its
orientation a moment ago.  After an initial spin, the orbit of thevirtual
magnets lags behind.  The larger the radius of the cylinder andthus the
greater the distance between it and the magnet, the greater thelag.

An instantaneous snap-shot of the magnetic fields from the real magnet's
perspective could look something like this:

                            |N|
                            | |
                            |S|

                            ***
                        *         *
                       *     /S/   *
                       *    /x/    *
                       *   /N/     *
                        *         *
                            ***

                            |N|
                            | |
                            |S|

where the real magnet has been given an initial spin in the clockwise
direction and the virtual magnets lag behind, say, 30 degrees at the moment
depicted.  Clearly the virtual magnets encourage the real magnet to keep
spinning.I suspect that there is a flaw in my thinking, but it seems to me,
and tothe person who proposed this to me, that with a proper set-up and after
theinitial spin the virtual magnets will proceed to chase the real magnet
aroundand around forever.  The angular velocity of the magnet will increase,
wefigure, until the phase-lag between it and the virtual magnets equals 180
degreees:

                             |N|
                             | |
                             |S|

                             ***
                         *         *
                        *    |N|    *
                        *    |+|    *
                        *    |S|    *
                         *         *
                             ***

                             |N|
                             | |
                             |S|

(Note that a phase-lag of 180 degrees means that their orientationsare in
phase, since the virtual magnets started out at rest with orientations 180 out
of phase with the real magnet.)  The angular velocity now remainsconstant.

So for those who have followed all this, what's the flaw?

               Reply to : nazrael@cats.ucsc.edu (James Vanmeter)
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