Posted by Scott Ellis (216.87.95.64) on March 12, 2002 at 23:50:52:
In Reply to: Re: another approach posted by Rob on March 08, 2002 at 08:16:15:
How is it possible to lift the balls faster than they are falling? If your design can actually raise the balls at a faster rate than they are falling, then IMHO you will have discovered a perpetual motion, since that means that you found a way to make a weight lift an identical weight through a greater distance than it fell itself.
All previous attempts have shown that in fact, a weight is only able to lift an identical weight through a shorter distance than it fell (using leverage).
Here is an example of a typical recirculating ball weight scheme.
In practice, these types of machines work as long as the weights are raised more slowly than they fall, but eventually stop when there are no more weights at the top. If the weights are raised at the same rate that they fall, the machines stand still. If the weights are raised at a greater rate than they fall, IMHO the machine will run backward until the weights going up balance the weights going down, then it will stop.
Best of luck to you. I hope you will keep us posted,
-Scott
: My idea is to lift the balls faster than they are falling.
: Has this "scheme" been tried before?