You would find that there is very lttle push from the smot. Place your finger at the top of the ramp and you will feel very little force when the ball hits it even at full force.
Don't waste time on gravity wheels- THEY DO NOT WORK!!!  they will always achieve equilibrium.
As far as a smot being capable of being OU I can say this without any reservation. If the goal of a closed loop is realized then by defult the smot is OU!!.
After all it is then capable of in effect recharging itself to keep running. It would be the same as dropping a ball and having the ball return to exactly the same height each time it was dropped. Currently this can never happen the ball will always have what is called "a coefficient of restitution" of less than one. One being returning to the same height each time. Now a closed loop smott would have the coefficient of resititution of 1 BUT since it also overcame friction and wind resistance its COR is more than one. Just trying to illustrate a point.
With a doubt a closed loop smot is OU a smot not closed is not.
How could a smot produce power?  Actually there is a number of ways. Since the ball is traveling throug a loop there is a vibration as the ball moves through. Quite possible electricity could be generated by stringing a piezoelectric configuration placed along the length of the return tube..
Think of a number of smotts side by side with a light magnetic shield between them generating energy from the piezo crystals all connected in series. Just a thought.
Also a small  windmill would easily be turned as the ball projects up the ramp. This again with other "windmills" ( one per smott) all connected in series. As a matter of fact here's a thought:
Ball goes up ramp spins small windmill connected to a small generator, ball drops though tube generating energy along it path by it's vibration being used in a piezoelectric configuration.
In the standard smot we see say on JLN Labs website the ball moves fairly slowly up the hardly inclined ramp. On my device because I am
really projecting this fast it would  turn a windmill blade,  To see if this would work I took a small plastic windmill and put in the path
of the ball. The ball shot thought it like it was even there and the blades spun. Obviouly very little torque to turn a generator but of course this is all very scaleable. Again hooking up x number of smott output in series might give us something. Again down the road thoughts.
The force from even my smoot would not push a gravity wheel setup - besides gravity wheels DO NOT WORK!!
One of the biggest challenges with smott technology has been to find away to rerout the ball from its drop point back to the smott and up the ramp. This has been achieved. We know that a ball will drop off the ramp under a lower height. So knowing that the problem seems to me that it is only necessary to "fine tune" the end to cause the ball to drop. Once it drops it will via the tube  take its self back to the smott enterence and up the ramp without any problem. I did that probably 200 times today.
Fine tuning the end is of course that "quantum leap" that Omnibus talked about. But since we know that we can get the ball to drop of the end of a smott with the correct config. of magnets and spacing (thus fine tuning) is this then really not possible with the more inclined ramp?  I Believe  there are ways of fine tuning the end by placing a magnet at the end of the ramp to "pull" the ball out from the magetic hold of the end magnets but not quite strong enough that the ball becomes attached to it.
In other words a precision adjustment config. to change distance and angle to achieve the point where that ball seperates from the end and falls into the return channel. I will be working on this idea all day on Wed.
Will keep you advised.
Its 11:30 pm Tues here in Oregon. Good night all
Bill

just an idea..

 But what about using 2 or more balls?

 Basically, one sitting on the top of the smot ramp that can not escape
the feild..     Yet another ball launches up and smashes into it with
great speed and force - knocking the other ball back thru the loop...
continuing the cycle.

I read through the whole thread thinking that same thing.  I saw the video posted of two balls being smacked together, and they ball seem to accelerate at a good speed.

I also thought of a toy you could make with this.  Have a little miniature Indiana Jones being chased by the ball.

Bill:

I have to agree with you that that may be one step closer to a closed loop. This is telling us something. I salute your investigations and experimentations.  Keep it up.

Bill

Anyone tried this guys device or even the mechanism which drives it?  I think I saw the video here before, but has anyone tried making something like this?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=us7YB7eiOeQ

I tried to draw it up as I saw it, but the pivot points are probably wrong.  The magnet is pulled downward away from the incoming ball.  Seems like the rest of the energy is conserved by the pendulum.  I think the stuff in the middle is just decoration.  Theres 3 of these moving swinging setups.

(http://aycu35.webshots.com/image/27954/2002357309255463584_rs.jpg)

It Should be continuous (or at least cycle a Lot more)
if you use only balls and no magnets to absorb
some of that force.    Have you tried it?

 

@Omnibus:

The reason I asked is because, from everything I have read on here, the closed loop SMOT appears to be one of the holy grails. This looks to me to be the real thing.  However, your point about redistribution of initially imparted energy is well taken.  I would like to see a video of this where it starts from a dead stop, with a slight push of the sphere. But, even if proved to not be OU, I give the man credit for a very interesting device.

Bill

Probably couldn't work, I'm not sure how this center punch works or if the force to compress it could be lessened.  Anyone?

(http://img122.imageshack.us/img122/4396/cpzk9.jpg)

http://www.freepatentsonline.com/20040154171.html

I don't have any materials to build a smot, but I have had some ideas. I have been told that when the ball is sent up the smot it has decreased momentum when it reaches the top, because even though the magnets may be pushing it, gravity is still pulling it down. If it decreases in momentum when going up, will it gain momentum going down? Say you have a smot that is going straight up; when it reaches the top, it doesn't have much momentum left. But what if we kept going up, over the side of the support, and started going straight down? To me it would start to gain momentum. However, the magnets on the other side will be effecting the ball through the support, thus the support will have to be made out of a material that will block the field. We could possibly use magnetic shielding. If the device is large enough could it gain enough momentum to escape the sticky spot as it reaches the end? Then as the ball is falling because it escaped, we could add a hole in the support with a funnel and tube to channel it back through into the other side, then getting sucked back into the magnetic field and the entire process is repeated all over again.

I have not had any experience with building smots, and I would like others input on this idea. To me, it seems very probable that it could become perpetual.