Gyroscopicgravity

[exnihiloest]

This experiment is really astonishing: http://www.wimp.com/gyroscopicgravity/

My question is: if the experimenter was weighed, would we see a decrease of the weight when he is holding the device with only one hand and the device rotates above his head?

[EMdevices]

nice!    

the guy twists the gyro about the vertical axis (the output axis), in the direction it wants to precess anyway, due to the torque about the horizontal axis created by gravity (the input axis).  

However, since he tries to speed up the precession rate, the gyro reacts and wants to twist and elevate its angle, so there is an upward force at the end of the shaft that takes some of the weight, so the guy then only has to supply a smaller force to keep the same elevation angle at zero, or horizontal.  

Question #1:     Is there an energy gain in this process?  

I don't think so, because the twisting occurs over a much bigger distance with a smaller twisting force (spiral motion and his hand twisting the shaft)  than the vertical distance traveled and his hand pushing up, so input energy into the system is equal to output.  This is simply a form of "gear ratio" or mechanical leverage, but done with gyroscopic principles instead of gears and levers.
 

Question #2   Can we create a flying aircraft based on this principles?  

Maybe!    


EM


PS   The guy says in the video that this "has been missed" by everyone, and that is not so.  These gyroscopic principles have been known for hundreds of years, and the way they react when twisted used in many designs.

[Peterae]

I am sure anyone who has played with a gyro has experienced the same thing, if you spin a gyro toy up in the horizontal position attached to a string it has a tendency to rotate clockwise if i remember here in the UK, it finds a slowish rotational speed to maintain a horizontal level position, if you help it rotate faster the unattached end lifts, if you slow it the unsupported end falls, it has a natural tendency to want to remain horizontal, NOTE it must be started in the horizontal position it seems to maintain this orientation, if it was started vertically it would need loads of energy to make it horizontal.Which is what makes them brilliant for navigation.

As he said there's enough energy to hurl it 200 feet into the air, so there's also enough energy to raise it a few feet.
The faster he rotates the faster it would want to raise, that's why when he got it high enough all he had to do was stop himself rotating and it fell, so the question would be, how much energy did he use to turn one full rev to allow the weight to raise, and how much to stop himself turn for it to fall, might be able to build a prototype water lifter to see, if the flywheel had a payload of 2 Kg of water and he turned faster then it would probably lift the weight and the water, release the water into a top storage vessel etc...

[Chef]

The guy in the video is Eric Laithwaite. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eric_Laithwaite

I have  several lecture videos, and some of his published work. He was a brilliant engineer .

[exnihiloest]

I am sure anyone who has played with a gyro has experienced the same thing,
...

Surely not. The only interest of this video is that it is not a simple gyro. It is a strong asymmetric gyro that shows new effects due to its very long and unusual axle.

[exnihiloest]

The guy in the video is Eric Laithwaite. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eric_Laithwaite

I have  several lecture videos, and some of his published work. He was a brilliant engineer .

Thanks for the link. Very instructive.

[EMdevices]

The demonstration was done with a long shaft to show us how unlikely it is that he can hold the end with so much weight at the other end.   The torque would be huge!  

Given a 40 lb weight 3 ft out from the pivot point, the human hand could not produce the necessary torque in the wrist to hold it horizontal.  It could hold it only if there was no torque, just the weight.   However, because the gyro processes, it generates the torque to keep itself up and the guy only has to provide the linear vertical force to counteract the weight.

Here's a basic question:  does the gyro generate a TORQUE?  or a FORCE that produces a torque when the axis is pivoted?


From what I remember, the gyro produces a TORQUE,   because if it produced a FORCE upwards, it could carry it's own weight, and that would be like anti-gravity!   which is not possible!  lol  

EM

PS,  I added the picture below.  Which is it, case 1 or 2?    The guy seems to say the gyro is "as light as a feather"  implying case 1, but I don't believe it!         It's case 2 for sure!  where the hand supplies only the counter force to the weight due to gravity (F_gravity) and does not have to provide the moment, which the gyro provides.    What do you all think?

[GibbsHelmholtz]

...
PS,  I added the picture below.  Which is it, case 1 or 2?    The guy seems to say the gyro is "as light as a feather"  implying case 1, but I don't believe it!         It's case 2 for sure!  where the hand supplies only the counter force to the weight due to gravity (F_gravity) and does not have to provide the moment, which the gyro provides.    What do you all think?

The counter force to the weight is 40 pounds.  He is not likely to lift it anyway.

Most likely he speed up the precession faster than its natural precession. 

[BEP]

I don't understand how this could be considered new. It is nothing more than a gyroscope on an extended shaft.

A toy gyroscope has the same action. Just extend the axis to see the same results. My eighth grade science teacher had a gyro on a pencil. Once spun he could hold it simply by letting the pencil point rest on the tip of his finger. The gyro precessed around the support point.

BTW:

Say what you wish but the weight of the spinning wheel is only partially felt by the person supporting the non-spinning end. Throw all the math at it you want but perform the experiment before hand.

[Peterae]

I played a lot with a gyroscope when i was young, they fascinated me, there's only so many experiments you can do and attaching the gyro to a pencil was one of them, ex are you saying that the scientific comunity know nothing about what is shown in the video, i am not saying i understand the theory about why it happens but at the age of 10 or 11 i came to the conclusion eventually that i could find no free energy or find a novel use for what was observed, and yes i was that Young when my interest was raised in such things.

There was a TV program on from 6 in the morning in the UK called open university, not that i ever understood much of the stuff but there was one particular program that always stayed in my mind, there was an old guy sitting at a desk with an array of bulbs, he flicked a switch and they all lit up, this was a demo of free energy, i wish i could remember his name, i was too young to fully understand the implications of what i was seeing, the other thing the same show aired was a globe, it had 2 spinning weights one at the top of the globe and one about 10 o'clock on the globe, they stated that when both weights were rotated that a magnetic field was produced, this may have been an explanation of the effect used to light the bulbs or it may have been a totally separate experiment, i would say this was in the mid 70's
I to this day do not understand why these were shown on TV as these programs were norally heavily scientific with sound theory, the programs were there for people to study at home and gain scientific qualifications, maybe someone older than me in the UK knows of the devices i speak off.

[exnihiloest]

I don't understand how this could be considered new.

Watch the video.

It is nothing more than a gyroscope on an extended shaft.

"A lever is nothing more than a balance with an extended shaft".
And nevertheless it has new properties, as the capacity to raise heavy weights with a light force.

A toy gyroscope has the same action.
...

Gives us references of a gyroscope toy whose the weight is apparently reduced when hold by the end of its axle.
You missed the point. A gyro just opposes to any angular change of the direction of the axle.

[exnihiloest]

I played a lot with a gyroscope when i was young, they fascinated me, there's only so many experiments you can do and attaching the gyro to a pencil was one of them, ex are you saying that the scientific comunity know nothing about what is shown in the video,

It's a possibility. Rather strange, because the video dates from the 80's. But it is a fact that there are not practical applications with gyros with extended axle (at my knowledge). It is likely that such an arrangement would have a practical utility in some cases. So it's not impossible that this gyro configuration has not yet been studied.

i am not saying i understand the theory about why it happens but at the age of 10 or 11 i came to the conclusion eventually that i could find no free energy or find a novel use for what was observed, and yes i was that Young when my interest was raised in such things.

There was a TV program on from 6 in the morning in the UK called open university, not that i ever understood much of the stuff but there was one particular program that always stayed in my mind, there was an old guy sitting at a desk with an array of bulbs, he flicked a switch and they all lit up, this was a demo of free energy, i wish i could remember his name, i was too young to fully understand the implications of what i was seeing, the other thing the same show aired was a globe, it had 2 spinning weights one at the top of the globe and one about 10 o'clock on the globe, they stated that when both weights were rotated that a magnetic field was produced, this may have been an explanation of the effect used to light the bulbs or it may have been a totally separate experiment, i would say this was in the mid 70's
I to this day do not understand why these were shown on TV as these programs were norally heavily scientific with sound theory, the programs were there for people to study at home and gain scientific qualifications, maybe someone older than me in the UK knows of the devices i speak off.

I confess that I don't know what to think about that. Until now, I considered that all old stories of strange effects were only urban legends. I now think that the most of them are urban legends, by far, but that some rare ones could escape from this rule. I have never seen elsewhere the effect shown in Laithwaite's video. I don't understand that we don't find explanations somewhere, and that some physicists who discuss this matter now on another forum are very surprised themselves and unable to give the solution.

[Peterae]

To be honest ex i am amazed this is not known about from a theoretical point of view.

The devices i spoke about were shown to work on this university program, so i wonder what happened to them, the elderly guy, Grey hair and quiet chubby was wearing a white overall and sitting behind a desk demonstrating an array of light bulbs, i could see no external power sources but then i could see no transformers or wires so it must have had the electronics inside the box of the light array , i cannot remember the exact number but it was a square array, maybe 5 x 5 bulbs all lit, he spoke in a very scientific manor, but i was too young to understand what he was saying.

I have never ever seen this device since.
Not surprising it has disappeared, i have seen numerous inventions that could have revolutionised the world, disappear in thin air even when they were proved to work, how's this one, again late 70's maybe early 80's a guy invented a liquid that when drunk would cancel any alcohol in the blood stream, the guy had previously drunk alcohol prior to the test, he blew into a bag to show he was over the legal drive limit, drank this liquid and a few minuets later blew into another bag and he was clear of all alcohol in his blood stream. boy i could have done with a few of those in my younger days  

Then there was a guy who invented another liquid which when sprayed onto an electric drill, the drill could then be immersed into a bowl of water and still work without electrocuting the chap holding it.

and recently a guy invented a liquid and repels heat, he sprayed some onto an egg and took a blow torch to the egg, after a short time he removed the blow torch and held the egg and said it was cool, he then cracked it to prove it was still raw, he died shortly after and never had a chance to reveal what the formulae was.

All these things were shown to work but for various reasons have never come to light  

[BEP]

and recently a guy invented a liquid and repels heat, he sprayed some onto an egg and took a blow torch to the egg, after a short time he removed the blow torch and held the egg and said it was cool, he then cracked it to prove it was still raw, he died shortly after and never had a chance to reveal what the formulae was.

I saw that show when I was working in Peterlee, UK    There was talk about NASA looking into it..

Ex,

I watched the video and there is nothing new. The 'apparent' weight of the object drops considerably. This is related to the problem with balancing rotating objects.

Under many circumstances the placement of a balancing weight must change depending upon RPM. The effect is like the mass of the balancing weight lags behind the rotational position of the balancing weight.

To solve the problem, dynamic balancers were developed.

Perhaps this is new to scientists but it is not new to the rest. My story of the gyro on a pencil happened long before the video was produced.

[GibbsHelmholtz]

To logically see if the weight is "apparent" and that it always remains 40 bl is easy.  Hold 40 bl in your hand and swing it like he does. lol  Even if the energy comes from angular momentum of the gyro, we still have something new.

[exnihiloest]

I reproduced Laithwaite experiments at a small scale. Here is a photo of my gyro. It is stopped but I noted the parameters.
http://tinyurl.com/dxcrcpt
The caption in English:
"Clockwise rotation of the gyro viewed by the operator
 +
Left rotation in a horizontal plane around the operator's fingers
 =
Upward force

If the second rotation is made toward right, the force is downward.
The effect of heavier or lighter weight is strongly felt."

[Peterae]

So here's my design for a vertical lift space craft

3 motors each motor has it's own battery on board, 2 of the motors have flywheels while the 3rd motor spins a horizontal bar which has the other 2 motors and flywheels attached.Motor 3 will need a gearbox to slow the rotational speed down.
I made a mistake on the diagram both flywheels need to be clockwise not opposing  

If it was this simple surely someone has already tried it.

The problem would be stopping the bottom plate rotating and this is where i see the problem, unless maybe a duplicate of the drawn device was attached under the plate with the flywheels rotating CCW

As a kid, i knew the flywheel would want to rise, but i always thought that the flywheel weight was still acting down from the pivotal point, in other words if the plate was weighed although the flywheel raises the plate will still register the same weight it did before the flywheel raised, i just realized the above video was done also with it handed to a child to hold so therefore the flywheel really must loose weight, or to put it another way, ex is off building a craft as we speak

[BEP]

So here's my design for a vertical lift space craft

3 motors each motor has it's own battery on board, 2 of the motors have flywheels while the 3rd motor spins a horizontal bar which has the other 2 motors and flywheels attached.Motor 3 will need a gearbox to slow the rotational speed down.
I made a mistake on the diagram both flywheels need to be clockwise not opposing  

If it was this simple surely someone has already tried it.

The problem would be stopping the bottom plate rotating and this is where i see the problem, unless maybe a duplicate of the drawn device was attached under the plate with the flywheels rotating CCW

As a kid, i knew the flywheel would want to rise, but i always thought that the flywheel weight was still acting down from the pivotal point, in other words if the plate was weighed although the flywheel raises the plate will still register the same weight it did before the flywheel raised, i just realized the above video was done also with it handed to a child to hold so therefore the flywheel really must loose weight, or to put it another way, ex is off building a craft as we speak

It will appear to loose weight but only if the device is allowed to precess in the correct direction. It should appear to gain weight when it is forced to precess in the wrong direction.

I'm pretty sure that is correct. Last time I performed the experiments I think I was about 20.

[BEP]

Ex,

Thanks for bringing this subject to discussion.

For years I've been trying to obtain an answer to a question with the responses ranging from ridiculous explanations of how a compass works to Riemann's zeta function.

I'm thinking now how this same effect is the same as two others....

1. When a simple magnet has a vertical trajectory relative to the surface of the Earth it reacts with a preferred vertical polar alignment. I'm thinking this action may be due to spin and gravity rather than magnetic attraction/repulsion.
2. When two magnetic hemispheres are forced together in magnetic repulsion and have a vertical trajectory no preferred polar alignment is seen but the fall velocity is less compared to an identically shaped and weighted but un-magnetized object. If you consider that each magnetic field is an indicator of many magnetic domains (gyroscopes) and the two hemisperes are in opposition (opposition in spin) then less apparent weight results.

Basically, a magnetic domain is also a gyroscope.

I'm working on enough to argue the point with myself.

[EMdevices]

I've taken a different approach to "solving" the mystery of this video.  

I went to the gym and tried to lift a 40 lb weight.   Don't laugh, but I could not raise it up with one hand over my head like the guy did!    

maybe the gyroscope does loose weight  

EM


PS  In physics this problem is stated as the rate of change of angular momentum is equal to the torque, and this is done with vectors.  For example:  a gyroscope spinning in the x-axis and offset from the pivot, is subjected to a torque produced by its weight times the lever arm distance.  This torque vector is in the y-axis, if the horizontal plane is defined by the x-y plane.    Now, since the torque vector is in the y-axis direction,  the gyroscopic precession occurs in that direction and is obviously proportional to the weight of the gyro and the magnitude of the torque.   So if we have a heavier gyro or the lever arm is farther out from the pivot, the precession speed will be more rapid.  It is important to know that no matter what we do to the axis of the gyro or how we twist it and turn it, we do not affect the energy of the spinning gyro.  The only thing that can slow down the gyro wheel is frictional losses.     Now think about this,  if we speed up the precession speed by applying the proper torque to the axis,  the gyro would have that speed if it would have been heavier, but since it is not, it can lift itself up, either by producing a force upwards, or producing a torque that pivots   and pushes down on the pivot and therefore lifts itself up.   It's the Case 1 vs Case 2 above.      Either one would produce the same results, but it's important to know if its a force of if its a torque that produces the forces when it pivots.

I think I've detected some fraud in the video.  When he weighs the shaft and says that we can tell by his voice that it is heavy, listen and watch carefully how he changes his voice to sound like he is exerting himself, but he starts to change his voice BEFORE HE EVEN LIFTS THE WEIGHTS.   This is all a show I'm afraid, and most likely the weights are not even 40 lb but perhaps much lighter so he is using a fake scale to weigh it.

[Chef]

I think I've detected some fraud in the video.  When he weighs the shaft and says that we can tell by his voice that it is heavy, listen and watch carefully how he changes his voice to sound like he is exerting himself, but he starts to change his voice BEFORE HE EVEN LIFTS THE WEIGHTS.   This is all a show I'm afraid, and most likely the weights are not even 40 lb but perhaps much lighter so he is using a fake scale to weigh it.

You have a very twisted mind.   This experiment was performed by Laithwaite  at the Royal Institution too.   He was not exactly like RomeroUK or other scam artist. I suggest you to read about Laithwaite ad his work, before you accusing him making fake videos! 

[BEP]

Throw all the math at it you want but perform the experiment before hand.

There is no fraud in this video. There is no need for fraud. Take my advice above before making that claim.

[e2matrix]

EMDevices,  Get a real gyro and play with it.  You'll see there is no fraud in that video if you have played around with a fast spinning gyroscope.  You can easily have a gyro attached to a string at one end when spinning and it will stay horizontal as long as it's spinning fast while only being held by the string at one end with nothing to support the other end. 

[BEP]

I think the part that confuses most is that the center of gravity always shifts from the center of the spinning mass to the point of support.

The length of the shaft means almost nothing because all of the mass weight is at the point of support (less the weight portions being translated by other motions).

I believe the officially accepted explanation is that no weight is lost or gained. It is simply shifted to another location.

[Peterae]

I believe the officially accepted explanation is that no weight is lost or gained. It is simply shifted to another location.

Which is exactly the conclusion i ended up with.

Looks like someone already built my UFO and his conclusion was it does not work