Free(or cheap) energy theory

Now before I start I just want to make sure people know this is just an idea that popped into my head when me and a friend were discussing it.
So I dont know if its been discussed before, Im not claiming to know anything, I just want you lovely ats`ers opinion on its plausibility.^^

A really simple idea came into my head for an endless supply of energy.
Gravity.
Why not make a rotating gyro of sorts in space, the motion would never stop once its started(or would it, Im not too sure when it comes to spinning as opposed to travelling forward, enlighten me), and a potentially endless supply of electricity could then be transferred to earth, perhaps with the recently discovered way of transferring power wirelessly.

I realise it probably wouldint end up[ "free" but it would certainly be infinite.

Any opinions?

Uh, no. That wouldn't work.

Space is a fairly good vaccuum, so if you never extracted energy out of it after putting it in space and spun it up, it would certainly spin for millions or billions of years. If it were in a perfect vaccuum, it could spin forever in theory. If it were orbiting something, it would slow down quicker, because of tidal forces. (that's why the moon has matched its rotation to it's orbit, so it always faces the earth with the same face.)

But spinning around in space as long as you don't touch it isn't good enough for free/infinite energy. You have to get something back out for it to be useful. And this is the trouble. What you've made is a spaceborne flywheel. A decent way of storing energy comparable to a capacitor, but certainly nothing that'll give you free or cheap energy. You'll only ever get as much energy back out as it took to start the thing spinning. That's far from infinite.

(it works out exactly the same for something moving in a straight line instead of spinning. It's just harder to attach a generator to something flying off in a straight line.)

The amount of energy stored in it is it's rotational kinetic energy, which is equal to it's one half it's rotational velocity squared times it's inertia around it's axis of spin. It takes that much energy to get it spinning, and that 's how much energy you can get back out. Minus losses in the generator, of course.

Think of it this way. You can charge a battery, and as long as you don't use the battery, it has energy in it. But that doesn't mean the battery has infinite energy if you leave it alone forever. It has a fixed amount of energy that you can take out just once, before you have to put some back in if you want to use it again. This is just a mechanical way of doing that.

That isn't to say that this is a completely unsalvageable idea. There is a lot of work (some even funded by the US government and NASA) going on to create flywheels on magnetic bearings in vacuums, to store electricity. With an energy density on par with capacitors, but at far less expense, they're seen as a good solution for storing power off the grid for buildings, in hybrid buses and cars, for trains, and for spacecraft. having the flywheels on magnetic bearings saves people the trouble of putting the object in space. You can already get them as a backup battery for your house or place of buisness. You're supposed to bury them underground, though, in case they break, because in the event of a major failure, the flywheel can come apart and explode quite violently. Newer ones under development are safer.

But this isn't a viable way to get free or infinite energy, just a way to store it for when you need it more.

Physically moving or spinning up an object is not going to give you any more energy back from its motion than you put into getting it up to speed.


Energy extraction from the natural world needs to be a bit more clever if we are to stumble across a "free energy" device.


The term "free energy" is a misnomer. If found, it will cost a little bit of money, and NO, it won't violate the laws of physics. We will just have to understand WHERE the energy comes from, because the sources we understand right now aren't explaining it.


I believe "free energy" is absolutely real, and absolutely possible to achieve.

NASA came up with a similar concept to yours.
A satellite that absorbs electricity from earths magnetosphere as it orbits the planet. It never happened however, as the energy output wouldn't cover the costs of producing the satellite, sending it into space, and then running it/maintaining it.
The bright individual who came up with the idea was written off because NASA claiming that even if a single unit ran for 500 years the cost wouldn't be covered.

Good thinking however, keep up the sharp imagination.

Originally posted by Crabmeat
NASA came up with a similar concept to yours.
A satellite that absorbs electricity from earths magnetosphere as it orbits the planet. It never happened however, as the energy output wouldn't cover the costs of producing the satellite, sending it into space, and then running it/maintaining it.
The bright individual who came up with the idea was written off because NASA claiming that even if a single unit ran for 500 years the cost wouldn't be covered.

Good thinking however, keep up the sharp imagination.

One problem with that is that the process of extracting energy from the magnetosphere causes something akin to an electrostatic drag on the satellite, slowing it down. Eventually, this would cause the satellite to fall to earth. Interestingly enough, I'm pretty sure this works in reverse, and a satellite can raise it's orbit by putting energy into the magnetosphere with a similar tether. Makes for a really cheap all-electric drive for station keeping in low earth orbit. Probably power intensive though.

Solar panels in space would provide much better power than terrestrial installations, because not only is sunlight much more powerful up in space (to the tune of 1000W/m^2 vs ~600W/m^2), but you get the full effect of the sun from as soon as the sun comes up over the horizon, until it starts being blocked by the earth again. The problem is of course the ridiculous expense of such a project. That and getting the power to the ground. I've always been partial to firing concentrated beams of microwave radiation at collection antennas, but maybe other people aren't so fond of the idea.

Thanks for the input people, I dont know why I didint think of the simple fact of energy in equals out, maybe you could keep it spinning with solar power though......hmmm anyone have a way how this could work.

reply to post by Outlawstar


Great idea.. I actually have "invented/discovered" something along these lines. Basically, I take a large rare earth magnets put it under a table (2 in x 2 in disc with a 370 lb pulling force). Then put a sphere 1.5 in sphere rare earth magnet on top of the table. The magnetic attraction keeps them both in place. Then I take a 1/2 in sphere rare earth magnet and place it in the "orbit" of the 1.5 in sphere. The interaction of the the 1.5 and 2 x 2 magnets create a pocket where the 1/2 in mag just sits in. Then I put my finger on top of the 1.5 in sphere and "process" it one time (just like the Sun but with out rotation). The 1/2 in sphere magnet in the orbit starts orbiting the 1.5 in mag at high speeds and keeps going for about 30 seconds until I "process" the 1.5 in mag again. You can repeat this over and over again forever. Magnets in motion with copper wire positioned perpendicular generates an electrical current. So I took winding of copper I had laying around and put it above the spinning magnet. I hooked that up to an LED light and it lit up.
I still have a lot of experiments to do but I think the electricity created is more than what it would take to "process" that 1.5 in mag every 20 seconds to keep it going forever.
Then.. if you think about it.. you could easily upgrade this to any size you would like to power, say a car, an entire house, maybe even a whole town if it were big enough... (I think smaller applications would be more practical though)
This does not defy the laws of physics.. energy cannot be created or destroyed, because the rare earth magnets are actually zapped with large amounts of electricity when they are manufactured.
Anywho.. I've got to get back to work...

Peace

Originally posted by danman23
reply to post by Outlawstar

 

Great idea.. I actually have "invented/discovered" something along these lines. Basically, I take a large rare earth magnets put it under a table (2 in x 2 in disc with a 370 lb pulling force). Then put a sphere 1.5 in sphere rare earth magnet on top of the table. The magnetic attraction keeps them both in place. Then I take a 1/2 in sphere rare earth magnet and place it in the "orbit" of the 1.5 in sphere. The interaction of the the 1.5 and 2 x 2 magnets create a pocket where the 1/2 in mag just sits in. Then I put my finger on top of the 1.5 in sphere and "process" it one time (just like the Sun but with out rotation). The 1/2 in sphere magnet in the orbit starts orbiting the 1.5 in mag at high speeds and keeps going for about 30 seconds until I "process" the 1.5 in mag again. You can repeat this over and over again forever. Magnets in motion with copper wire positioned perpendicular generates an electrical current. So I took winding of copper I had laying around and put it above the spinning magnet. I hooked that up to an LED light and it lit up.
I still have a lot of experiments to do but I think the electricity created is more than what it would take to "process" that 1.5 in mag every 20 seconds to keep it going forever.
Then.. if you think about it.. you could easily upgrade this to any size you would like to power, say a car, an entire house, maybe even a whole town if it were big enough... (I think smaller applications would be more practical though)
This does not defy the laws of physics.. energy cannot be created or destroyed, because the rare earth magnets are actually zapped with large amounts of electricity when they are manufactured.
Anywho.. I've got to get back to work...

Peace

Sounds cool, keep at it and keep us up to date.
I personally think magnets are the key.

As has been stated, the initial idea wouldn't work, but as has also been stated, keep thinking! I have had a lot of 'bad' ideas that proved to still be useful for something that at first seemed completely unrelated.

Keep in mind that science is not divided into different sections; that is only how we as a society perceive it. Energy is out there, and while it's never 'free', can never be truly 'perpetual' (things break, that's life), and never can break the (true) laws of physics, it can be cheap and plentiful.

Remember Edison: "Invention is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration."

TheRedneck

Originally posted by TheRedneck
As has been stated, the initial idea wouldn't work, but as has also been stated, keep thinking! I have had a lot of 'bad' ideas that proved to still be useful for something that at first seemed completely unrelated.

Keep in mind that science is not divided into different sections; that is only how we as a society perceive it. Energy is out there, and while it's never 'free', can never be truly 'perpetual' (things break, that's life), and never can break the (true) laws of physics, it can be cheap and plentiful.

Remember Edison: "Invention is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration."

TheRedneck

Thanks for the nice input.

reply to post by Outlawstar


hi - the obvious response is why not just tapp the output from the solar panels DIRECTLY ? i assume you

the way i read it - you intend to supply electrical energy from solar panerls to drive a motor to spinn the gyro

then tap the gyro to produce power

if that assumption is incoreect then my appologies

but now its laid out - can you see where the losses occur ?

efficiency of the drive motor to spin the gyro is < 100%

the gyro itself presumably has bearings - which have a friction load

as stated previously - the gyro will loose enegy from micro gavitational pull and interaction with particles - a very small loss - but its occuring

lastly - what ever means you use to draw enegy from the gyro and convert it to a useble force has both an effeicency rating AND exerts a braking force on the gyro

the only convebale use of a system such as you describe would be to maintain power while the solar panels are in darkness - but IMHO battery banks would be more efficient and have a higher energy density than the gyro and its associated equipment

Originally posted by ignorant_ape
reply to post by Outlawstar

 

hi - the obvious response is why not just tapp the output from the solar panels DIRECTLY ? i assume you

the way i read it - you intend to supply electrical energy from solar panerls to drive a motor to spinn the gyro

then tap the gyro to produce power

if that assumption is incoreect then my appologies

but now its laid out - can you see where the losses occur ?

efficiency of the drive motor to spin the gyro is < 100%

the gyro itself presumably has bearings - which have a friction load

as stated previously - the gyro will loose enegy from micro gavitational pull and interaction with particles - a very small loss - but its occuring

lastly - what ever means you use to draw enegy from the gyro and convert it to a useble force has both an effeicency rating AND exerts a braking force on the gyro

the only convebale use of a system such as you describe would be to maintain power while the solar panels are in darkness - but IMHO battery banks would be more efficient and have a higher energy density than the gyro and its associated equipment

You assumed right, thogh I did say "maybe" and left the door open for others to concieve a way this might work, but thanks for the info filled post.