Has anyone reproduced this lafonte experiment before?

[broli]

A Long while ago Butch Lafonte showed and interesting effect using magnets in attraction between two iron bars. These magnets are very easy to move apart when they are between those bars. However interestingly he also showed that it takes less force to pull the bars away from the magnets when they are apart. In essence creating a power cycle with a net energy gain.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NCaj3e_g_q8

The anomaly here is that the simulation of this shows the opposite. The force to pull the bars apart increases as the magnets move apart as you can see attached. Anyone care to give it a test?

[Grumpy]

Wow! Last I heard mention of Butch LaFonte, they had a self-running device.  I wonder what happened after that...

[broli]

Wow! Last I heard mention of Butch LaFonte, they had a self-running device.  I wonder what happened after that...

Yeah he mysteriously disappeared from the scene. Given his age he could have also reached the finish line of life.

[Chet K]

He had a fellow who worked with him
Dusty ?
I have some old contacts for Dusty
Will also ask Stefan if he has any contact info for Butch

Actually
I might have a contact somewhere ..
Will report back one way or the other .

[Smudge]

Your simulation shows force at a fixed position.  The important thing is not force, but energy needed to pull the bar away from the magnets, and that is force times distance.  You should repeat the simulations to chart force v. distance moved for the two cases.  Put the data on a spreadsheet and compute the areas under the graphs which are of course the energies.  You may then find that the two energies are very different.  And while you are doing this you can simulate the complete movement over the full cycle of x and y movements to see whether it really does create OU.
Smudge 

[broli]

Your simulation shows force at a fixed position.  The important thing is not force, but energy needed to pull the bar away from the magnets, and that is force times distance.  You should repeat the simulations to chart force v. distance moved for the two cases.  Put the data on a spreadsheet and compute the areas under the graphs which are of course the energies.  You may then find that the two energies are very different.  And while you are doing this you can simulate the complete movement over the full cycle of x and y movements to see whether it really does create OU.
Smudge

I have already done this. The force always follows a inverse distance squared relationship and it takes more work to pull the bars away when the magnets are apart so nothing special. The simulation is to show that the simulated results contradict Lafonte's experiment, where the force to pull the bars (granted the initial force only) is higher when the magnets are together.

EDIT: Added the average force table too for pulling the bars away from the magnets in two cases. But again this shows what you expect. There is also no strange peak in force and a sudden die off which would explain Lafonte's result. Hence why this has merrits for a replication.

[Smudge]

I have already done this. The force always follows a inverse distance squared relationship and it takes more work to pull the bars away when the magnets are apart so nothing special. The simulation is to show that the simulated results contradict Lafonte's experiment, where the force to pull the bars (granted the initial force only) is higher when the magnets are together.

That inverse distance squared relationship applies to isolated point poles and magnets are never like that.  Those values you measured are far from inverse distance squared.

EDIT: Added the average force table too for pulling the bars away from the magnets in two cases. But again this shows what you expect. There is also no strange peak in force and a sudden die off which would explain Lafonte's result. Hence why this has merrits for a replication.

That was such a crude experiment that I would not put any credence on the result.  That huge weight he used looks like steel to me so the stray field from the magnets could apply force there which might affect the result.  The two force values he obtained are close in value.  In any case an OU machine would use the energies, which you have shown to be significantly different.  Lafonte's anomalous force value will still result in the sort of energy ratio you show.  When you look at the full cycle although there is little force needed to move the magnets while the moving bar is close, that is not true when the bar is some distance away.  So over a full cycle it is clear that any gain obtained from those two energy values for bar movements in the y direction is likely lost in the different energy values for the magnet movements in the x direction.
Smudge 

[broli]

That inverse distance squared relationship applies to isolated point poles and magnets are never like that.  Those values you measured are far from inverse distance squared.
That was such a crude experiment that I would not put any credence on the result.  That huge weight he used looks like steel to me so the stray field from the magnets could apply force there which might affect the result.  The two force values he obtained are close in value.  In any case an OU machine would use the energies, which you have shown to be significantly different.  Lafonte's anomalous force value will still result in the sort of energy ratio you show.  When you look at the full cycle although there is little force needed to move the magnets while the moving bar is close, that is not true when the bar is some distance away.  So over a full cycle it is clear that any gain obtained from those two energy values for bar movements in the y direction is likely lost in the different energy values for the magnet movements in the x direction.
Smudge

The energy gain part is when the magnets move close to each other when the bars are away. The experiment was indeed pretty crude, but it showed an interesting anomaly which merits replication.

[F6FLT]

What anomaly?

It is possible to approach magnets or ferrormagnetic bar and then move them away by a different path, with a difference of forces between the two steps, suggesting that one could gain energy in a cycle. Lafonte does this here in a subtle way.
Unfortunately, as Smudge has already said, a force is not energy. Energy is the work of force, so you have to measure the force point by point on the path of the sliding magnets between the bars, then sum up the product of force and displacement on the whole path, then do the same thing for the bars that are moved away, and then you'll see that you gain nothing.
I remember many attempts of this kind, of course they never succeeded.

The theory is still right: the work in a potential difference, in this case the magnetic potential determined by the relative positions of the objects, does not depend on the path followed between the starting and ending positions, but only on the starting and ending positions. On a cycle, this work is therefore zero. This is true for all potential energies.