Bessler’s wheel was Enabled To Turn Continuously by Gravity

This blog is copied from one I posted on 14th March 2016.  I still think it’s a valid viewpoint, ten years on.

I return to this subject from time to time, always seeking clarification.  I know that gravity cannot be a source of energy, I've been told so more times than I can remember.   But it does seem as though Johann Bessler thought that the 'heaviness', i.e 'ponderousness' or as they say in Latin the 'gravitas'  of the weights inside his machine gave the wheel the necessary energy to continually rotate.

Notice that there is a subtle difference between what we know as 'gravity', which is some kind of force field which attracts other things of mass - and a thing's inherent 'heaviness'.  Is there a difference?  Bessler believed that it was the 'heaviness' of the weights in his machine which gave it the power to turn continuously, but we always take one step further back in the process, i.e. was it the thing that caused the 'heavinesss' in his weights which he did not know of  and which we call 'gravity’, that caused them to move?

Can it be that this whole apparently pointless enterprise, making a wheel turn continuously simply by constructing a clever configuration of weights, has been doomed to failure because man sought the source of the 'heaviness' when it did not matter where it came from, he should have just been glad it was and is there?

We accept several different forms of energy which we can turn to our advantage in one way or another but the fact that we know from where it originates and how it works and how we can best make use of it, is not neccessarily something we need to know.  People have sailed ships using the wind as an energy source for millenia.  Same for windmills for grinding corn etc.    Others learned how to use water wheels in a similar way.  Clock makers even used 'heaviness' to drive their weight-driven clocks, long before Sir Isaac Newton called 'gravity'.  Just because no one seems to have discovered how to manipulate weights to rotate a wheel continuously does not mean it can't be done.  I'm certain that Johann Bessler knew and yet he never mentions the word gravity in any of his publications, because it wasn't known about for many years after Sir Isaac Newton descibed it in Latin as 'gravity'.

My point is this, weights are inherently heavy, we know it is the effect of gravity but we don't actually need to know that to use them.  Gravity is not a source of energy but it does create the conditions which can lead to a device being able to exploit the heaviness which gravity gives to an object of mass.

So when Bessler said, " NO, these weights are themselves the PM device, the ‘essential constituent parts’which must of necessity continue to exercise their motive force (derived from the PM principle) indefinitely – so long as they keep away from the centre of gravity."  That is what he meant; the heaviness in the weights, not some remote force called gravity.

Interestingly he used the word ''gravium', at the end of the sentence above which I have translated as, 'centre of gravity', but I subsequently learned that the word ,'gravium', is the genitive plural of 'gravis' which I learned means 'heaviness', so Bessler uses the phrase 'centre of heaviness', which means the same thing but when you put it into the correct context of his time, you can see that he is not referring to the same thing as we are when we use the phrase 'centre of gravity'.  He is simply stating that the centre of heaviness is at a certain point but has nothing to do with the force of gravity. We on the other hand, mean that the centre of gravity refers to the action of gravity on the whole structure and identifies the balancing point between both sides affected by the fore of gravity as the central point.

In the second paragraph I suggested that we habitually looked at the conditions prior to the use of weights, or what gravity did to the weights, whereas we should be looking at the weights themselves as they were at the time of their use. We have been looking one step back and ignoring the evidence in front of our eyes.

All we need to know is that the weights are always heavy just as long as gravity is affecting them.  Gravity enables the wheels to move and it’s up to us the determine the correct configuration to obtain continuous rotation.

We know Bessler’s wheel worked; we know the weights themselves were the source of the wheel’s rotation.  There is therefore, definitely a configuration which works, but we haven’t found it yet despite all the abundance of Bessler’s clues.

PS. Today, 1st September 2026, I’m currently building a wheel which I think will work, I’ll keep you notified of the results of a test.

JC

Besslerrad.com

I don’t usually promote other websites detailing the life of Johann Bessler aka Orffyreus, I used to do it but as time passed sometimes they disappeared or they become outdated, and I’ve had to lose some of mine because of the cost of running several sites simultaneously.  But there is one site which is full of information about the inventor and although it was originally in German, it is now available in English.

I’ve corresponded with Volker Keller off and on for about sixteen years, he is the same age as me, 81, has two daughters, just like me!  I asked for permission to publicise his web site and he agreed, so please take the time to visit his site.  It’s brilliant.

Besslerrad.com

JC

Find Out How Bessler’s Wheel worked by Deciphering his Drawings.

I and some of my fellow researchers, believe that Johann Bessler intended  to leave a number of clues which once deciphered would reveal the workings of his wheel.  This was to protect his invention, and still have his name immortalised, should he die before he was able to sell it. I have studied all of his drawing over the last several decades and it has been difficult, to find the exact information needed to replicate Bessler’s wheel, but I have found a lot of clues, mostly not immediately helpful.  The clues are fairly easy to find but their meaning is not so obvious.

After his death, a piece of paper was found upon which the inventor had scribbled a  message. It reads,

Further demonstrations regarding the possibility and impossibility of perpetual motion. 

‘N.B. 1st May, 1733. Due to the arrest, I burned or buried all the woodcuts that prove the possibility. However, I have left all demonstrations and experiments since it would be difficult for anybody to see or learn anything about a perpetual motion from them or to decide whether there was any truth in them because no illustration by itself contains a description of the motion; however, taking various illustrations together and combining them with a discerning mind, it will indeed be possible to look for a movement and find the Besslerwheel action in them'.

I’ve posted a copy of the note below.  It’s rough and hardly legible but the meaning is clear

This is another example of Bessler sowing confusion by providing ambiguous 

Pinformation. On the one hand he’s telling us that he has burned or buried certain woodcuts which prove the possibility of perpetual motion. I assume he burnt all the drawings that were on paper, but buried the actual woodcuts from which he could print.  But he then he suggests that someone with a discerning mind might still find the solution by studying various illustrations.

I understand why many people assume he was referring to MT, because the message was written on the back of one of pages from MT.  But in my opinion I think he was hinting that there was another source of information leading to the answers and it could be found by studying other illustrations.  This note was written in 1733: long after GB, AP and DT had been published, but MT wasn’t even finished and he had no plans to publish it.  So he didn’t necessarily mean just those in MT. I refer to the ones in GB, AP and DT. 

At the end of his hastily scribbled note, I believe I see the word for ‘infinite’ or ‘unending’, which seems to have been omitted in the English translation.  So that phrase should read ‘… t will indeed be possible to look for an unending movement and, finally find one in them'. 

I also see what appears to be Bessler’s favourite icon or symbol, the circumpunct, representing his wheel.  This suggests that the last line might be intended say,  ‘….it will indeed be possible to look for a movement and, finally to find my perpetual motion wheel in them'.  See the circumpunct as Bessler’s wheel in the image at the top of this page.

Bessler wrote in his book, Apologia Poetica, “Those who are keen to ask questions should ask them of this little book. My work will not be revealed prematurely.”  He wrote this hint about hiding his secret in the AP book way back in 1717, so I doubt that he was alluding to his MT.

There are a number of different clues which are designed to point anyone who seeks to solve this puzzle, in the right direction, but they don’t necessarily form part of the solution.  They are framed to concentrate the mind in the correct part of one or more of the drawings, from which you must extract the right configuration. All of the drawings contain valuable information but it is not easy to make the correct choice or know what is useful and what is a deliberately inserted clue to confuse or divert attention from the right interpretation. There are almost invisible lines, hinted at but not drawn in, so the images require extensive and prolonged study to understand what Bessler was showing us.

Apparently every picture tells a story and although the GB one seems similar to the first one in DT, there are subtle differences which seem to point in other directions.  I don’t want fill this space, detailing all the nuances of the pictures, suffice to say, I have described many of the clues I have found over many years both here and on my other websites.  But to be honest I’ve never described the way to decipher the drawings, but I believe I’ve made enough headway to complete my latest model.

Of course I don’t know if it will work, but this configuration is new to me. So fingers crossed……again!

JC

When Will a Working Bessler’s Wheel Appear for Testing?

Recently I was reading the predictions of various ‘accredited’ forecasters, soothsayers and futurists and superforecasters (their terms, not mine). These days, serious predictions come from data scientists using AI studying climate change and economics. But is there anyone apart from our own homegrown soothsayers who are predicting the emergence Bessler’s wheel in the near future?

There are famous seers such as Nostradamus who cleverly embedded his predictions in a number of four line verses, which made his meanings notoriously difficult to extract and has led to large amount of confirmation biased suggestions which can be dismissed or not, according to one’s own gullibility factor. He didn’t predict Bessler’s wheel, although Bessler too, made use of four line verses to hide his secret information, rather in Nostradamus’s fashion! Perhaps he was familiar with the old seer?

But I was unable to find anyone predicting the imminent appearance of Bessler’s wheel.  I guess there’s a mountain of negative confirmation bias against such a prediction. Several years ago I contacted one of the largest gambling/betting companies in the U.K. and asked about betting on the appearance of Bessler’s wheel in the next ten years.  My bet was rejected but the guy’s reason for the rejection was that such machines were impossible and went against the laws of physics, and anyway if I was placing a bet on it, how did he know if I might or might not, have already built a successful machine!

A soothsayer or predictor might one day pronounce on the success of  a Besslerwheel, but given the universal rejection of such a device it seems unlikely and possibly foolish for anyone to do so.  But "we few, we happy few, we band of brothers…" (from Shakespeare’s Henry V) continue relentlessly to seek Bessler’s solution. Why?  Because we know that Bessler succeeded in building a gravity-enabled wheel which turned continuously. It has been argued that he must have deceived all the people who examined the device, but no one has been able to offer any suggestions about how he was able to fake all the demonstrations.  

The sole purpose of those tests that were carried out was to eliminate any way of deceiving the public and that has proved to be a major stumbling block for those to make claims of deception or fraud.

And so we continue to seek the answer, how did Bessler do it?  

The most likely source of information leading to the solution, is to be found in Bessler’s many clues, both graphic and textual.    A solution needs to be found now.  Not because Bessler’s wheel could reverse climate change, it took over 300 years to bring about climate change, but a multitude of uses may be found for Bessler’s wheel, but what can we do about OIL?  Well it has huge number of uses none of which involve burning it in car engines.

Without burning it, oil is used as a chemical building block to make plastics, synthetic fibers, and rubber. It also serves as a mechanical lubricant, a base for skin lotions and cosmetics, a protective coating to prevent rust on metal, and an ingredient in asphalt for roads.  The possibilities are endless, as someone once said.

JC

August Update - Getting the Right Configuration for Bessler’s Wheel.

I understand why those who dismiss my suggestions about Bessler’s wheel, such as the importance of the number five, do so.  I have never filled in the blanks convincingly and without a working model incorporating all of those interpreted ‘clues’, no words of mine are ever going to persuade people that I’m right,

Recently I began working on yet another design but still based on my interpretation of those infamous clues that I’ve ‘obsessed’ over for many years.  My experience with this particular design has proved quite difficult because getting the pivots in the right place is only part of the problem.  Getting the length of the levers involved and placing each one’s connecting pivot correctly was difficult, also it was necessary to restrict a portion of the arc of each lever as .it moved, in order to stop it locking at either end of each action. This reduced the effectiveness of the actions, but this limiting factor can be overcome by adjusting the pivot position and the length of each lever.  Another problem occurs when adjoining levers clash during their action because they’re too close to each other.  Again this can be overcome by using longer pivots which raise the lever in contention, or just bending them upwards to clear the offending one.  This can solve an immediate problem but ultimately requires an improved layout to maintain actions.

So it’s a trial and error process, or rather a case of comparing several variations to discover which obtains the best result.  I also I have to ensure that I don’t overt-tighten the fixed pivots to avoid slowing or limiting the free movements of the whole assembly.  So I  always loosen each locknut by about three-quarters of a turn from fully tightened. This tends to lead to some looseness of all parts but it’s better than having everything too tight.

In this particular case I have come to the conclusion that when Bessler said he awoke from an inspiring dream, but still had to work on it for a long time before he got it right, I can fully appreciate those difficulties.  I still think it will prove almost impossible to build a successful working Besslerwheel without a fully hands-on approach, but I would be delighted if someone were to prove me wrong.

I work with a sketch pad, drawing ideas that I think Bessler is describing and trying to fit them into a coherent combination that might contain an overbalancing advantage but include a natural reversal mechanism, operated by the same parts which caused the initial action. 

I know I always think I’ve finally got the answer, but that is an important part of the research.  The optimism generated by the idea that I know the secret is a vital ingredient in wanting to carry on.  The knowledge that Bessler succeeded and was determined to leave information about his wheel and my own certainty about the clues he left, is enough to maintainer my appetite for building new designs and keep my enthusiasm continuing.

When I moved house about four years ago, I threw so much stuff away, thinking it was of no use because it was all failed mechanisms. There were more than 20 assorted round wood blanks with hundreds of small perforations drilled for insertion of various pivots; a huge 8tangle of discarded levers of all shapes and sizes.  Now I wish I’d kept some but they’re gone now, and of course I have a few new ones to modify.

One day my interpretations will lead to a successful wheel and I believe that, if not by me then by someone else using my interpretations of the clues.  There are so many clues I have never mentioned because detailing them all would be too tedious and time consuming, and they need to be taken as whole, not little bits here and there.

JC

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July Update

My biological father came from a long line of courageous and determined people, I probably don’t have his flair for adventure but the family motto is 'Dum spiro spero' (While I breath I hope) and that suits me just fine.  I’m a firm believer in Johann Bessler’s claims about his perpetual motion device. I recognise his determination to hide his clues about his wheel within his published works, in the hope that one day someone will succeed in deciphering that information, long after his death.  This would lead to world-wide acknowledgement of his achievement.  So as long as I have breath in  my body I will continue to bring to the public's attention the work of this amazing and clever inventor.

I have read about all the latest alternatives to fossil fuels, nuclear and solar power, wind tidal etc; all the new electric power engines, and their variants, ingenious but very expensive - but it still seems to me that there is and will be a place for Bessler’s gravity enabled generator. Time will tell, but I think Bessler’s wheel will prove to be the cheapest machine to generate electricity.

So where am I with my own model of Bessler’s wheel?  So my latest offering has some crucial changes, but still using five mechanisms.  The clues I’m using were found within his drawings and also in his text in more than one book.  One problem in interpreting his clues lies in their ambiguity, but one can work through the alternatives and hopefully come up with his intended meaning.

As soon as I’ve finished this latest model I’ll post pictures, if it’s working or not, I’ll also show for the first time exactly where I obtained the information about the actual configuration of the wheel. This is because I’m moving home soon and will not building any more wheels, although I shall continue to promote Bessler’s wheel.

One of the most convincing features of this search is the incredible amount of coded information that Bessler inserted into his published works (note that I always say ‘published’ because his Maschine Tractate was never published and although it contains information it wasn’t aimed at us)

His use of a number of ancient coding systems including some of his own invention, means that there is still a huge amount of deciphering, decoding and interpreting remaining to be accomplished, in addition to much of my own efforts.  I’ve pointed out the various places which obviously contain coded information, but apart from some minor work in identifying it, I remain unable to decipher the inventor’s meassage, 

I hope that with the publication of a working Bessler wheel, there will be flood of both professional and amateur code breakers all hoping to be the first discover what Bessler had to say.

Bessler routinely provided back-up clues to confirm deciphered information when achieved, and it takes a small effort understand the clues and what they mean.  Unfortunately it’s my experience that many people don’t bother to work out the clues from my explanations, preferring to go for something requiring the minimum amount of intellectual reasoning.

I’m always optimistic that his wheel will be reconstructed, maybe by myself, or someone else, but sooner rather than later!

JC

Bessler’s Knowledge of Freemasonry

The comments in this blog sometimes throw up some surprises and occasionally send me on a different path leading to new information.  One such comment which I admit I was tempted to ignore, but then it pointed out something I had missed.  I don’t think it will help find the solution, but it might!

This picture appeared in the comments on my blog I think it was on the May 8th.  I’m sorry I  can’t find the poster, I just copied the image but I’m sure  you know who you are. So this is what I saw:-

It’s an ingenious interpretation, but only if you are looking for the number 7.  I don’t think any of them look like 7s at all and I think I’ve found a better interpretation.

Given his demonstration of Euclid’s instructions on making a pentagram in his Weissenstein and Merseburg wheels, and his description of the golden ratio and the 345 triangle in MT 137, I suggest that Bessler was familiar with many of the tenets of Freemasonry, and we know many of them. 

Notice the three right angled triangles coloured blue, they make me think of Pythagorean triangle 3.4.5.  The number 5  placed adjacent to the middle triangle seems like a hint that these are 345 triangles.  The well-known formula for the Pythagorean triple (often called a triple right triangle) is a set of three whole numbers that perfectly fit the Pythagorean theorem, \(a^2 + b^2 = c^2\), where \(c\) is the hypotenuse. The most famous example (3, 4, 5) is clearly intended in Bessler’s picture.

Apologies for reminding us, but  the square on the hypotoneuse equals the sum of the two squares on the other two sides. There are three right angled triangles.  Three of them together is known as the Pythagoras triple triangles.  This meant that triple right angles were composed of whole numbers or integers - no fractions or decimal points so that you can calculate any size  using whole numbers.  But there are a limited number triple triangles having whole number integers, 16 of them in the first 100 numbers..

In Freemasonry, the 3-4-5 triangle—often called the Pythagorean Triangle—is used in the 47th Problem of Euclid to symbolise the creation of a perfect right angle. Operative stonemasons in Egypt, historically used a 12-knot rope stretched to this ratio to ensure their foundational corners were completely square.  Bessler dropped hints about the importance of Euclid’s 47 the problem by providing a total of 141 MT drawings plus 141 Bible references in his Declaration in Apologia Poetica.  The only factors of 141 are 3 and 47.

The drawing above is well-known symbol used extensively in Freemasonry.  Count the black and white squares bordering the right angled triangle, they number three, four and five.

Three triangles are also included in the Weissenstein and Merseburg wheels in DT.  But why was it indicated in some of Bessler’s pictures?  We know that Bessler was well-taught by a famous teacher, Christian Weise, and studied a broad range of subjects, including maths in which he excelled. Perhaps his inclusion of the Pythagoras Theorem was merely to substantiate his claim to be a mathematician, regardless of the lack of documentary evidence.

Or could it be part of yet another clue to be solved indicating how his wheel worked.

Just demonstrate my point here is rough attempt to draw in the Pythagoras triangles in the Weissenstein wheel.

Several right angles are apparent, but I still can’t see any advantage in seeing them, but perhaps some else can make sense of this?

JC

Solving Bessler’s Wheel - What Is Your Dream?

I wonder how many of us engaged in the search for the solution to Bessler’s wheel, - or, come to that, the solution to creating a perpetual motion machine - have an idea or dream, of what their lives might be like if and when they succeed? Is it fame and fortune, or the supreme pleasure gained from seeing the so-called experts who dismissed our ideas from the outset, proven utterly and disastrously wrong? Maybe just a simple acknowledgement that you did it; or perhaps the earnest hope that it would provide a potential solution to the climate-warming proponents. 

Many people plan to patent the design, but not I, because the cost of maintaining intellectual copyright would be an onerous and expensive task.  There is another aspect to it that may or may not become a problem for a would-be patentee.

It has been suggested that Bessler discovered the only configuration that could produce a continuously rotating gravity-enabled wheel.  If, as has been suggested by many people, including myself, that Bessler embedded the design of his wheel in plain sight in some drawings he left for us, good enough for someone with a discerning mind to find and copy, then surely if true, then any working device produced in the near future would have a similar configuration to Bessler’s. Seeing as Bessler published the design, albeit disguised, more than 300 years ago, would that preclude the granting of a patent?

JC

UPDATE - Fabricate is Better than Simulate - For me anyway.

 A few months ago I was persuaded to share my latest thinking on finding a solution to Bessler's wheel.  I posted a design I had been working on at the time, but the action generated by each falling weight was slow and  cumbersome.  Although it generated some discussion I knew before I posted the details it was never going to work, regardless of any alterations I made to the design.  My inclusion of five sets of scissor mechanisms was too much for a light weight design, intended to react instantly and easily.  So I thought long and hard about simplifying the problem and I came up with an improved mechanism.

But this improvement sparked a completely different design, one that I’m busy installing on the old MDF disc which serves as basis for all my designs. I can’t show you yet, because it’s not finished, but I’m just making a point here about working with actual mechanisms, which I’ve done all my life.  It’s so much more rewarding using actual physical material rather than relying on simming actions alone.  This new design occurred to me during the process of improving an action already built. Yes, sims have their place I suppose, although if you’ve got a working model, why would you bother to sim it - if you could?  But I  can’t anyway.

So the model currently under construction requires adjustments to enable the fall of a weight to move the mechanism, easily.  Sounds familiar but this is definitely not the same problem.  Getting the pivot points in the right place takes some trial and error, not error actually, just an improved lift.

Anyway I’ll update you all on my progress as often as I can, this design is not one I’ve seen before so I’m hopeful that this time it’s a good one. It looks right on paper, but getting the sizes of the levers right and their pivot points right is not so easy.

:JC