Timeline for Perpetual motion machines and rocketry
Current License: CC BY-SA 4.0
22 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| May 25, 2021 at 21:32 | comment | added | RonJohn | @Kevin hmmm, I had forgotten all about clutches. | |
| May 25, 2021 at 21:17 | comment | added | Kevin | @RonJohn Are you honestly arguing that it would be too difficult to attach a gear to a cube rotating at 1Hz? We connect two spinning things all the time via a clutch, but at 1Hz you could probably just attach something by hand | |
| May 25, 2021 at 18:53 | vote | accept | BMF | ||
| May 25, 2021 at 14:49 | comment | added | BMF | @RonJohn I think I understand your point about fusion. What my people have to contend with are simple Newtonian dynamics. Place the spinner in a solid foundation, wait until the opportune time while it spins in place, and then quite quickly and exactly attach the gear mechanisms. The fastest spinners rotate close to 1 Hz. The vast majority are much much slower. They could probably eyeball it. | |
| May 25, 2021 at 14:45 | comment | added | BMF | @RonJohn It is not irrelevant. I had thought it was irrelevant earlier, but then I came to realize there are material constraints on the amount of torque that can be garnered from such a small object. With some help I've since found a working solution. Spinners are an integral part of my people's civilization. Their (engineering) constraints greatly influence the worldbuilding as a whole. | |
| May 25, 2021 at 14:40 | comment | added | RonJohn | I question whether you understand the point of my nuclear fusion comment. IOW, yes; if something is too hard to do, we don't do it. That should be obvious. (Having said that, the actual engineering is certainly irrelevant to your story.) | |
| May 25, 2021 at 14:15 | comment | added | BMF | @RonJohn so you're telling me that, with the enormous power presented by abundant, infinitely-spinning, hand-sized cubes, people will forgo using it because they're just "too difficult to attach" and hook up? | |
| May 25, 2021 at 14:10 | comment | added | RonJohn | "A simple matter of engineering" is what every non-engineer with a supposedly-great idea says when he ignores that engineering is what takes science and makes it work. For example, take nuclear fusion: we know how it works, and can even fuse hydrogen. So... why isn't all our electricity generated (directly) by fusion? Because engineering is hard. | |
| May 25, 2021 at 14:03 | comment | added | BMF | @RonJohn sounds like a challenge for the engineers to solve. Doesn't strike me as an absolutely crippling problem, though. | |
| May 25, 2021 at 13:58 | comment | added | RonJohn | You miss the point: motion can only be harnessed if you can attach gears to the spinners, and that's really hard to do when the spinner is constantly/only moving. | |
| May 25, 2021 at 13:51 | comment | added | BMF | @RonJohn youtu.be/TOsB4Vhpkw0 small rotations can be translated into high rotations. No matter how many gears you continue attach, the counter-torque from all those gears sapping energy from the spinners does not slow down the spinners' rate of rotation. | |
| May 25, 2021 at 13:46 | comment | added | RonJohn | How do you harness the energy from (aka "attach gears to") these spinners when they can't be stopped? | |
| S May 25, 2021 at 10:49 | history | mod moved comments to chat | |||
| S May 25, 2021 at 10:49 | comment | added | L.Dutch♦ | Comments are not for extended discussion; this conversation has been moved to chat. | |
| May 24, 2021 at 19:41 | answer | added | TLW | timeline score: 6 | |
| May 24, 2021 at 15:59 | answer | added | Matthew | timeline score: 2 | |
| May 24, 2021 at 10:45 | answer | added | PcMan | timeline score: 10 | |
| May 24, 2021 at 7:13 | history | became hot network question | |||
| May 24, 2021 at 3:26 | answer | added | The Square-Cube Law | timeline score: 7 | |
| May 24, 2021 at 2:29 | answer | added | JBH | timeline score: 8 | |
| May 23, 2021 at 23:26 | answer | added | jdunlop | timeline score: 20 | |
| May 23, 2021 at 23:13 | history | asked | BMF | CC BY-SA 4.0 |