Disenchanted with Bessler's wheel? Energize - Invigorate - Revitalize!

I'd be interested to know how people became aware of, and interested in, Johann Bessler.

I fear that the enthusiasm for Bessler's wheel is waining. I don't mean those who are already 'on board' so to speak but 'newbies' seem to be few and far between. I note that the majority of those who frequent the websites devoted to Bessler with an open mind are retired or approaching retirement, I apologise to those to whom retirement is still a long way off, but there does seem to be a lack of interest in this puzzle among younger people. I assume it has something to do with the public perception of 'perpetual motionists', as we are seen to be. The facts about Bessler are completely swamped by negative opinion and a humorous/scornful approach to descriptions of those who are dedicated to finding his solution.

When I began this journey in 1997, by publishing "Perpetual Motion; An Ancient Mystery Solved?", I was pleasantly surprised by the amount of interest worldwide, I don't mean that it became an instant best seller (I wish!!!) but there were emails from all around the world and lots of interest from academics as well as engineers and people from many varied professions and as well as educated amateurs. Now there is nothing. I see that posts on the forum have largely dropped to armchair discussions - few people have any input on possible solutions any more. Do we think we have we exhausted every possible concept or design? I know I haven't and in fact I'm working on something that I feel more confident about than I have for some time.

Of course I was helped in the early days by articles about my book, appearing in Nexus magazine, Infinite Energy magazine, the Journal of Free Enery and others. This may have triggered interest in my book - I don't know. But I do think that this subject does not appeal to younger people and I regret that. When you look back at the history of great scientific discoveries, many were made by people in their intellectual prime, usually their twenties and thirties, and the majority were not 'professional' scientists but educated amateurs. Some, such as Michael Faraday, had only the most basic education yet his achievements in the fields of chemistry, electricity and magnetism were huge. I feel that we need to find some way of attracting the interest of younger people to inject some new thinking into this ancient topic.

When I finally get around to finishing my book on Bessler I will court the advertising media again as I did in 1997 but I have nothing to offer them at this point so there is nothing to new to engage them. I don't know how we can engender new interest but we must keep trying.

PS. Note the American spelling in the title - I love all those 'z's!  As did Bessler.

JC

Another bunch of clues interpreted

Recently I said that I would comment occasionally on one or two of Bessler's clues, so here is another one I've been working on. This one is my interpetation of the strange passage which follows:

“He will be called a great craftsman,

who can easily/lightly throw a heavy thing high, 

 if one pound falls a quarter, 

it shoots four pounds, four quarters high.”

Firstly, the most obvious point is that if one pound falls a quarter and lifts another four pounds then we have a total of five pounds and those who are familiar with my work in decoding Bessler’s clues will at once recognise the presence of the ubiquitous number 5 again - which I have suggested refers to five mechanisms.

Secondly, he implies that there are five one pound weights (one plus four), but one of them is falling. Since one of the falling weights is one pound and the other four being lifted are also one pound each, all five of them are of equal mass - one pound each.

Thirdly it follows that if one of the weights was falling and four were rising, then there were either five one pound weights in total, alternately falling and being lifted again - or there were ten one pound weights, operating in pairs within the five mechanism, five falling and five rising. I suggest that there were in fact five pairs of similar weights, and the reason I think this, is because elsewhere he says,

 “... a work of this kind of craftsmanship has, as its basis of motion, many separate pieces of lead. These come in pairs, such that, as one of them takes up an outer position, the other takes up a position nearer the axle. Later, they swap places, and so they go on and on changing places all the time.”

This description supports my contention that there must have been ten one pound weights operating in five pairs.

Fourthly, if  "..it shoots four pounds, four quarters high,” then one pound is shot one quarter high, which is no big deal from a similar weight falling the same distance.

Fifthly, "...if one pound falls a quarter, " it means it falls 90 degrees. If a pendulum is placed upside down against a clock face with the weight at twelve o'clock, then it can only fall in total, 180 degrees, or half way around the clock to the six o'clock point. If it falls a quarter then it only falls from twelve o'clock to three o'clock, 90 degrees.

It should be also be remembered that when the bi-directional Kassel wheel was started from a stand still it required only the smallest of pushes from two fingers for it to begin to accelerate, BUT it was also reported that rotation did not begin until a single weight was heard to fall, hence the phrase "...if one pound falls..." , meaning that it only takes one pound weight to fall for the whole wheel to begin to rotate and therefore cause the other weights to move.

There is one more piece of information in the passage which I am still working on but I don't want to discuss it at this time.

The above quotation is an extremely clever piece of text containing a wealth of information and I believe there are other pieces which may also contain additional information if we only knew how to extract it.

JC

Updates and words that unintentionaly offend

Recently, I intimated that I had a small revelation to make - and now I have written it up on one of my websites. I haven't published it yet, but now I'm wondering if I'm right, and if I am, should I be broadcasting it, and if I'm wrong do I want to stick my head up above the parapet to get shot at again?

Its not much of a revelation, I think that word was used by another blogger who used it when I mentioned that I had something else to discuss. I had what I think was a moment of clarity just before I went on holiday and nothing I have done since has dispelled the feeling I have that I'm right - but as I always say, I've been there before - and been wrong before! So I'm making a video to show the effect which I have described on my web site (not published yet) and I'll include it there. I mention this now because I've had a couple of emails asking me when I'm going to reveal it, but I'm not ready yet.

On another subject, writing blogs and responding to comments can be a tricky business, and I am as careful as I can be not to upset people and if I discovered that someone had taken offence at my words I would be extremely sorry. I have always requested that people moderate their language and try to do myself. Recently I discovered that someone had felt personally insulted at my words and I regret that, I therefore offer my sincerest apologies - they know who they are. May I say that having read and reread my words I can find nothing to take offence at, in fact they appear to me to be supportive of that person's view so I am at a loss to understand where I have overstepped the mark. Perhaps a private communication to explain would assist my understanding?

JC

J.E.E.Bessler -> W.R.R.Orffyres

Having time away from all things Bessler while on holiday, allowed me time to think and mentally review many things I had speculated upon. One of them was Bessler's use of his pseudonym - Orffyreus.

I have spoken about the fact that Bessler was born with just one forename, Elias. About the time he invented his working wheel he adopted the pseudonym, Orffyreus, using the 'Albam' method - at the same time he added two additonal forenames, Johann Ernst. I think that the Hebrew 'Albam' method of encoding these names is familiar to everyone interested in this story. I had always thought that having two 'E's as his initials was meant to point to the numbers '5' or '55' which are present in encoded form seemingly throughout his publications. However there has always been a disquieting feature to this idea which has caused me some doubt as to my interpretation of it.

For a start in this case, the fact that Bessler used the Albam alphabetic substitution rather than alphanumeric susbstitution to obtain his pseudonym, suggested that the former is to be used and not the latter, in which case the fact that 'E' is the fifth letter of the alphabet is no more than a fortunate coincidence.

In addition, converting the intials J.E.E.Bessler through 'albam' results in W.R.R.Orffyres, and the 'W' is formed from two V's which, in Roman numerals, produces the number '55' again and to suggest that the two 'E's represent the '5's too, seems almost tautological (if there is such a word!). Seriously is it likely that Bessler would have used the letter 'J' for any other reason than as part of an albam code? He could have left the 'J' out and used alphanumeric substitution to get '55'. So the letter 'J' is important but so is the letter 'R' which is derived via the 'albam method from 'E'.

You can see Bessler's own version of the letter 'W' above left, which differs from those used in the fraktur font - except when used to point a finger at his enemies, Gartner, Wagner and Borlach, taken from Apologia Poetica, the metaphorical passage!!!  It is definitely two 'V's.

So the letter 'J' leads us to the letter 'W' which points to 55. Now if the letter 'E' is not deliberately included to point to 5, then it points to 'R', its albam equivalent. Bessler routinely signed his name with a large 'O', presumably short for Orffyreus; he included a dot in the middle so it could also represent his wheel. But then he added two letter 'R's, one on either side of the 'O', the left one pointing the wrong way. This appeared to represent a wheel supported by two 'R' shaped figures.

Artistic as this may seem, there has to be more to it than sheer artistic vanity. It was important enough to add new forenames to his pseudonym, and the number 55 was of great importance to him as is clear from the many occurences of it, so one must conclude that the letter 'R' was of at least equal importance. The only thing I can conclude from my own research is that it has to refer to the path of the weights. One weight moves through a short curved circle and the other one moves through a longer less curved circle.

I have my own theory about how this helps and I am writing my ideas out in detail and I will post them when they are done. I'm considering doing another video to explain graphically what I mean, but if anyone else has any thoughts about the letter 'R' and its meaning I'd love to hear it.

JC

Planes that go bump in the night - when skimming a hurrican.

Three weeks away in sunny Florida and no access to my workshop - and my wheel! But now I'm back and eager to bring a fresh approach to the task thanks to some imaginitive thinking while away.

Although I love roller coaster rides I suffer from a fear of heights, motion sickness and a compressed disc which gives me pins and needles in my left leg, so by the time we had come to the end of our stay I had had a surfeit of thrill rides, so when we discovered that hurrican Irene was bearing down on us just as we were due to board our aircrafte, my wife and daughter expressed their doubts at the wisdom of flying through the middle of a hurrican, in rather colorful language actually!

We were assured by the aircrew that we would be flying around Irene and not through her and there were, therefore, no grounds for concern - huh!!! A sudden drop of 200 feet without warning, may not seem much, but when you add in the air speed of over 500 miles an hour it acquires considerable significance - my head bears the bruises to show for it, as I had just risen from seat in my usual gentlemanly fashion to allow my wife to partake of the facilities provided by means of a restroom. That was just the beginning and we suffered about an hour and half of something not so different, I should imagine, from trying to stay on board a bucking bronco!

Tough devices these modern aircraft! Despite the wings flapping like a demented duck landing on a pond, we all arrived safely if somewhat bruised and were politely informed that we had made up some time despite taking a longer course due to the sling-shot effect engendered by skimming the edge of hurrican Irene! Hhhhmmmm - as my seven year old grandaughter is wont to say, "I smell a porky, grandad!"

Actually the sling-shot idea came up in conversation aboard the bronco and we thought it had merit, but then we had taken a few medicinal drinks to calm my wife's shattered nerves - not mine of course you understand.

Open for comments again and hopefully I shall have some interesting information to share with you all that miiiiiiiiight just lead to a break through - unless you prove me wrong of course.

JC

Gravity-alone is all that is required for Bessler's wheel

This isjust a parting shot as I'm going away for a couple of weeks and all comments will be hidden until I return.

The source of energy for Bessler's wheel has to be gravity and nothing else, for some pretty obvious reasons.  Bessler certainly implied that it needed only gravity, but even if you  stick to the physics we have been taught, that such a device is impossible, and that Bessler was toying with us, then you need an additional force to assist the wheel to complete one rotation.   So what forces are available to us?

Ambient temperature changes might have been used to make changes in the weight positions - too slow to react in my opinion and perhaps not enough of a movement to generate overbalance.  Centrifugal force is another posited force but it would be difficult to regulate when to apply its theoretical movement.  Magnets?  Too weak and too difficult to switch on and off.  Compressed air?  It has to be compressed first and that would use up precious energy before it can apply itself to moving a weight.  Springs?  These are delayed reactions created by compressing them a some other stage in a rotation thus using up energy again.  Electrostatic forces? The Leiden Jar was invented in 1745 by Dutch scientist Pieter van Musschenbroek of Leiden, who some will remember featured in my book, "Perpetual Motion; An Ancient Mystery Solved?"  Again too weak a force and it would take too long to build up sufficient force to move a weight in several rotations let alone a single one.

There are others which are even weaker than those described briefly above and not readily adapted to quick or sudden requirement.  In my opinion gravity-only offers the only solution and I know why it works and why it isn't impossible and why it won't make the slightest difference to the laws of physics and all of the ramifications connected to that statement. 

All will be revealed upon my return  - I hope  ;-)

JC

Bessler's wheel must have been driven by gravity alone.

Someone posted a link on the bessler forum, in support of their view saying "all forces in closed systems are conserved. It's widely available knowledge."  The implication seemed to be that because of this fact we were all wasting our time trying to duplicate Bessler's wheel.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conservation_law

The first line of the link says "In physics, a conservation law states that a particular measurable property of an isolated physical system does not change as the system evolves."

You can't argue with this - it is demonstrably true. However it doesn't apply to Bessler's wheel. Isolated systems are, as the definition suggests, closed sytems without any access to external sources of energy.

But in a gravitywheel such as I maintain, Bessler's was, if you take away the gravitational force the wheel will remain stationary, therefore it cannot possibly be described as an isolated system. Gravity is external to the wheel.

So although the law of Conservation is correct the particular ramifications alluded to, do not apply in this case.

It is frequently argued that Bessler did not state in precise language that his wheel depended entirely on gravity and therefore it must have required some additional force to operate. I don't think anyone has come up with a creditable alternative force and in my opinion there isn't one - there is only gravity and there is no physical reason why it should not do.

So Bessler may have only said that - "these weights are themselves the PM device, the essential constituent parts which must of necessity continue to exercise their motive force (derived from the perpetual motion principle) indefinitely - so long as they keep away from the cemntre of gravity." - but that is as close to saying it was driven by gravity as you can get without actually saying so!

I have argued this point since I first expressed it in my book, "Perpetual Motion; An Ancient Mystery Solved?" in 1997 and I see no reason to change it.

JC

Why the number 5? What does it mean?

In a recent comment, Andre reminded me of something I have become so used to that I had forgotten how extraordinary it is. He said; It's monumentally obvious that the number 5 had a very special and important meaning to Bessler. It pops up everywhere."

I think this is something that people forget or are unaware of or disregard - and yet Johann Bessler was so preoccupied with the number five that he inserted it or hid it,in every single document he published as well as many that never saw the light of day, until recently.

Everyone is familiar with the pentagram and its association with the number five, and Bessler certainly was, because it too, appears, or should I say, is hidden within, many of his drawings. Hidden it may be, but it is easily found once you are aware of his fondness for it. Space prevents me from detailing all the many coded references to the pentagram and the number 5, but you can see some of the evidence at my website http://www.theorffyreuscode.com/

So the question is; why did Bessler include so many references to the number 5?

I suggested that it was to tell us that a gravity-driven wheel, capable of driving another device, has to have five mechanisms to accomplish the task. I also considered it likely that it was intended as a pointer to the most comprehensively encoded text of all of Bessler's publications, chapter 55 of his "Poetica Apologia".

Bessler became known as 'Orffyreus' at about the same time he first exhibited his wheel, a single-direction one, in 1712. So at that time he must have already decided on a simple code, alphabetic substitution, to use as a pseudonym for Bessler, probably designed to suggest that at least he had an interest or was knowledgeable about such things. In addition he added two more forenames to his given one, which was "Elias". The names, "Johann Ernst", do not appear on his birth registration documents but a glance through my website at http://www.theorffyreuscode.com/ shows how he also introduced the same 'number five' theme into his pseudonym at or before the time he first exhibited his wheel.

It seems to me that he must have already decided to encode information about his wheel so that, at some point in future, he would be able to show that he was the original inventor, long before he was successful - and to me that is a likely scenario as I have been guilty of the same!

So does the number five relate to the wheel or the code or something else? The problem is that the number five and the pentagram have several connotations. In fact they hold so many commonly understood, subjective cultural and emotional associations, in addition to their explicit or literal meaning, that the potential for misinterpretations are boundless. Connections include,the golden section, Mary Magdalen, the planet Venus and Freemasonry, to mention just some  the morer diverse ones.

I think that Bessler found the best way to produce a gravitywheel which was suffiently powerful to be able to drive an additional piece of machinery, such as a water pump. This design required five mechanisms for reasons which I will discuss in a later blog. Five then formed the core of his subsequent code. He built a large dual direction wheel at Kassel, which required two lots of five mechanisms - one for each direction - hence the ubiquity of the two number fives i.e."5,5". What better use of "5,5" than to write his autobiography "Apologia Poetica", incorporating his code into Chapter 55 and inserting numerous pentagrams into the drawings in other documents.

How delightful to fill the ensuing book and all his drawings with veiled references to the his mysterious number 5s - and sit back and watch as others pored over the clues and tried to make sense of them!

JC

Maybe Karl described the simplicity of the concept, and not the wheel itself.

I suppose I should mention this on the Besslerwheel form but it doesn't seem to warrant a new thread; it's just my musings again.

When Karl's emissary, Nathaniel von Stapff, first approached Bessler with a view to checking out his claims, he must have made it clear to Bessler that in order to take advantage of the Landgrave's patronage, he would be required to reveal the secret, under an oath of silence of course, of the wheel's construction. Clearly this was a highly contentious issue for Bessler and yet he was persuaded to accept, the issue molified to some extent by the promise of 4000 thalers for the privilege.

So before Karl could even consider such a proposal he had to verify to his own satisfaction that Bessler's wheel actually worked, and since the Kassel wheel would not be finished for several months, and the previous, Merseberg wheel, had been destroyed, the wheel Karl saw must have been the small model mentioned two or three times elsewhere.

This small model may have been Bessler's first fully working model or even one which showed some rotation without providing enough to drive another device and it could only turn one way. It may have been the same one that was found in pieces after his death, and the same one that Jean-Pierre de Crousaz wrote somewaht sarcastically about. So when Karl described its simplicity he was probably describing the basic concept and not the interior of the Kassel wheel.

It is evident that Karl was heavily involved with matters of State and probably never took time to view the interior of the larger wheel, so one might conclude that although the concept appeared extremely simple to Karl, as he examined the model wheel - and that idea was born out by Bessler's own fears that any potential buyer might think he deserved his money back once he knew the secret, in fact the actual working model might have been considerably more complicated.

By complicated I mean that, whereas I have always maintained that Bessler indicated that five mechanisms were necessary to a fully functioning wheel, there might have been as few as two in his model version - a very simple concept and an ideal method of constructing a proof of principle version.

JC