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Author Topic: Sjack Abeling Gravity Wheel and the Worlds first Weight Power Plant  (Read 823302 times)

Omnibus

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Re: Sjack Abeling Gravity Wheel and the Worlds first Weight Power Plant
« Reply #1170 on: April 30, 2009, 08:04:56 PM »
If you create a reactor object with no trajectory (via. moving it from one position to another after moving the frame time) it will simply fall, endlessly if there's no ground plane...

Correct. Question is what has really been done here.

Omnibus

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Re: Sjack Abeling Gravity Wheel and the Worlds first Weight Power Plant
« Reply #1171 on: April 30, 2009, 08:09:00 PM »
@Jubjub,

What is the accuracy set to in your sim and can you make it, say, ten or hundred times less grainy (increase the accuracy of calculations) and then run the program again with the new limits?

Jubjub

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Re: Sjack Abeling Gravity Wheel and the Worlds first Weight Power Plant
« Reply #1172 on: April 30, 2009, 08:24:23 PM »
@ Ericdt

It's a common "error" in max with the "explosions". I would suggest that you try the new 2010 version.
I believe they have been working to fix that problem. (I'm not sure if they actually FIXED it or just made it better - it has never been too much of a problem for me)
Also you should read the new help-file regarding reactor as they are adressing this issue.

But in general take a look at your values and specifically distance-tollerances and your substeps/key. If the substeps are not high enough and the motion in the scene is too fast, objects could be interpenetrating with the result that everything explodes when the object try to move away from each other.
Also check for the difference between Havok1 and 3 in regards to what type of simulations you are trying to run.

Hopes this helps  :)


@ Omnibus

Quote:"So, what you're showing us is a natural behavior of the device, just like the the natural fall of the stone let go from some height w/ respect to ground?"

That is indeed the case  :)

I believe this whole "D"-idea with the permanent "out-of-balance-wheel" is pretty old. And my guess is that there has been a lot of people trying to build it over the years (centuries). Actually I built one with magnets and what not several years ago but never got it to run.

When I read on this forum about the idea it surfaced again in my memory and I just thought "What the hell, I'll just try and make a 3d-model and see if it works"

First I tried with just one wheel with dumbbells, but it came to a stop after a few revolutions. So I made a copy of that wheel, rotated it 15 degrees and attached it to the second one and voila! It just kept on running.

Sometimes it slows down a bit, but picks up speed again - I believe this is due to both:
1. The way my "sliding holes" are cut and the way the dumbbells are hitting the barrier.
2. The number of substeps I'm simulating. (Default is 10, I used 15 - Higher is better, but more timeconsuming)

But overall I think that the sliding holes position and shape is of minor importance - It will ofcourse help the machine to run better if they are optimized and moved around to "the sweet spot". What this place is I don't actually know though :D

Omnibus

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Re: Sjack Abeling Gravity Wheel and the Worlds first Weight Power Plant
« Reply #1173 on: April 30, 2009, 08:26:37 PM »
@All,

Check this out (see attached) at default values (air resistance off etc.) which I take to represent ideal conditions. The CCW rotation is observed also with much less grainy accuracy conditions, so it isn't an issue.

Omnibus

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Re: Sjack Abeling Gravity Wheel and the Worlds first Weight Power Plant
« Reply #1174 on: April 30, 2009, 08:35:44 PM »
@Jubjub,

I don't exclude the possibility that such machines had been in existence centuries ago but have been severely suppressed. That's beside the point here, however. What you're saying and presenting deserves utmost attention. First off, that 2D wheel making several full turns isn't to be ignored at all. Never mind it stops eventually.  What are the conditions for that and can you make a vid (sorry to be so pushy but, as you can imagine, I'm really curious to see that)? Also, my version is Autodesk 3ds Max 2009. Do you think it's the right version for what you're showing. If so, probably I should start with your 2D model.

Omnibus

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Re: Sjack Abeling Gravity Wheel and the Worlds first Weight Power Plant
« Reply #1175 on: April 30, 2009, 08:58:37 PM »
@Jubjub,

I was able to open it but haven't used the program for a long time. How do you start the motion? Just clicking on the Start button won't do any good. Probably it has to be rendered first or something.

AquariuZ

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Re: Sjack Abeling Gravity Wheel and the Worlds first Weight Power Plant
« Reply #1176 on: April 30, 2009, 08:59:23 PM »
@All,

Check this out (see attached) at default values (air resistance off etc.) which I take to represent ideal conditions. The CCW rotation is observed also with much less grainy accuracy conditions, so it isn't an issue.

VERY interesting.

AquariuZ

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Re: Sjack Abeling Gravity Wheel and the Worlds first Weight Power Plant
« Reply #1177 on: April 30, 2009, 09:00:38 PM »
I'm using 3ds max - A 30-day trial can be downloaded from http://usa.autodesk.com/adsk/servlet/index?id=5659302&siteID=123112

I have uploaded my max-file to http://rapidshare.com/files/227559769/GravEng08_1.max (It's for Max 2009 and later)

@Omnibus,

You are both right and wrong about the whole trajectory thing.
If you model a a stone with a given weight, an unyielding groundplane, add some gravity and use max's Reactor to simulate the whole thing, the stone will drop to the ground (and bounce around depending of the amount of elasticity, friction and general surface shape).
However if you want to create a scene with a football penetrating a window you would set the animation up as you stated.
Something like animating the ball over 10 frames, and then let the physics system take over.

I've been using Max for more than 10 years, so I believe I've got the hang of it over the years. (My job is creating commercials, and visual effects for video and movies - how cool is that?  :D)

Downloading....

Thanks a lot!

AZ

Jubjub

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Re: Sjack Abeling Gravity Wheel and the Worlds first Weight Power Plant
« Reply #1178 on: April 30, 2009, 09:01:32 PM »
@ Omnibus,

I wanted to make you a file with just one wheel, and decided to take the one that I allready uploaded and just delete the barriers and dumbbells on the far side.
Just for kicks I started the simulation... - And it kept running... ???
I don't rule out that I may have made some kind of mistake somewhere. That sort of thing happens all the time in my line of work (usually we are going by the "As long as it looks good it doesn't have to be realistic"-rule).

In my earlier attempt, where the wheel would come to a stop, I started to work with the size of the dumbbells, their weight, the wheels details and so on - When I decided to put in the extra wheel it actually might have been working with just one wheel - or my settings where too low. I really can't say.

Yes, I'm running the 2009 version - 2010 is lying next to me on the table, but I haven't gotten around to install it yet.
So just open the file, delete the far dumbbells and you should be ok to press the simulate button  :)

Jubjub

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Re: Sjack Abeling Gravity Wheel and the Worlds first Weight Power Plant
« Reply #1179 on: April 30, 2009, 09:04:37 PM »
About the "How to start the simulation" question:

I think it will be enough to just watch this short video from Youtube - A reactor tutorial: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TbVIu61fQcA

Omnibus

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Re: Sjack Abeling Gravity Wheel and the Worlds first Weight Power Plant
« Reply #1180 on: April 30, 2009, 09:18:12 PM »
@Jubjub,

I got it -- through Reactor. You the man. Now we have to analyze this very very carefully. It's close to unbelievable. The 30 degree offset may be something very important. Where do you put the initial conditions? Let's play first with them, increasing the accuracy.

Also, can you redo the grooves on the wheel to be as in @Dusty's wheel? Be interesting to see if it'd make any difference.

Omnibus

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Re: Sjack Abeling Gravity Wheel and the Worlds first Weight Power Plant
« Reply #1181 on: April 30, 2009, 09:32:49 PM »
@Jubjub,

So, I see, the dumbbells are 200kg each and the wheels with the grooves are each 1kg. Concave Mesh is the simulation geometry but there are other geometries. Why did you choose this? Friction and elasticity are set to zero -- ideally non-rigid both the dumbbells and the wheels. So, while friction is modeling ideal conditions one would expect ideally rigid to be the ideal condition of, at least, the dumbbells. Probably we should change that just to see what happens. This was from first glance.

EDIT: I ran it w/ friction set to 0.3 and elasticity to 0.5 on all parts which are the default values in wm2d. Rendering gets excruciatingly slow on my laptop at that. Maybe you can try it on your computer if it's faster than an average laptop.

ruggero

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Re: Sjack Abeling Gravity Wheel and the Worlds first Weight Power Plant
« Reply #1182 on: May 01, 2009, 12:15:18 AM »
Is it too much to ask if you could provide the rest of us with your amazing simulations in some standard movie formats like AVI, QUICKTIME, SWF etc.– please...?

ruggero  ;-)

BTW: Beautiful job on the 3DMax (rough version)

erickdt

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Re: Sjack Abeling Gravity Wheel and the Worlds first Weight Power Plant
« Reply #1183 on: May 01, 2009, 01:05:00 AM »
Due to the site being down for maintenance yesterday I was unable to upload anything until today.

Here's the link for the video of my rough version -> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3skVetNsbZY

As for the Max-file you'll have to wait until I get home from work (Yes, I'm at work right now...)

I finally got the chance to see your video (my work machine is 64 bit which doesn't support flash player). Very nice. If you need help rendering an animation of these I've got 16 processors and a licensed copy of MAX 2009 at my disposal.

E

Dusty

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Re: Sjack Abeling Gravity Wheel and the Worlds first Weight Power Plant
« Reply #1184 on: May 01, 2009, 01:37:57 AM »
Okay, I'm back with another report.  I know this is getting positively ridiculous to have this many video's of this gravity wheel, but I just want to show the step by step progress on the ideas as they develop.

As an over view of this project, after the patents were posted I proceeded to build a 3D model of the basics that were given.  After building the machine I had something real for testing which led to making changes for the purpose of seeing what might be better.  If an idea was worse then I went back to what worked better.  So far I made one change to the lower track and just recently I made one change to the upper track.  On the wheels themselves I tried four different slot layouts.

Now I'll explain each video test, and keep in mind I'm looking for the most rise in the dumbell and also the rotation of the wheels. 

In this video I'm showing new hockey slots that are aiming straight towards the axle from both sides. 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7pH6Wgr9H-k&feature=channel_page     video 0763

In this wheel I flipped the two wheels and cut a new hockey end to test the opposite slot angle as compared to the original slots.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L71bZRCOJBc&feature=channel_page      video 0764

Here I've added the curved slots.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pbc1kStM9Wg&feature=channel_page     video 0765

This was real interesting, I'm showing a test I thought up, showing that the wheel going past the 360 degree point by having the dumbell fall and follow the track.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FZ4i9leznEk&feature=channel_page        video 0766

In this video I removed the dumbell and attached a five lb weight and just had it fall and rotate, not following the track, and it went 16 inches less than the previous video.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-qjStWmfvnI&feature=channel_page       video 0767

In this video I'm showing just one dumbell fall and follow the track.  This hockey slot track was the original slots on the wheel.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=74G_kSf5cS4&feature=channel_page      video 0768

Then this last video is showing the new upper track layout, with super fast acceleration.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_pmdExy6xsQ&feature=channel_page     video 0769

One thing I haven't showed is that I have used 2.5 lb, 5 lb and 10 lb weights for the dumbells.  More weight actually slowed down the rotation and too little weight didn't provide enough torque.  It looks like 5 lbs. is just right.

So now I'm just about finished with this first wheel.  I have one or two more tests with the track layout for optimization of bumbell rise.  Then it's time to build a bigger wheel.  It will be six feet in diameter and will have all eight dumbell weights installed.  A bigger wheel will make more room for all weights and give a longer hockey stick for extra leverage.  On the lift side of the wheel the distance from the slot to axle will remain the same as you see in the current wheel, but the outer torque distance will increase almost twice the distance.  I'm going to use the curve shape on the bigger wheel.

Thanks