Leibniz's advice to Bessler regarding the Tests.

I'm posting this because I think we have ignored the process which led to the design of the various tests applied to the wheel.  As will be seen, a lot of thought went into working out what possible tests could be undertaken which would eliminate as much as possible any accusations of fraud.  

Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz was Germany's leading philosopher, scientist, mathematician, engineer, inventor and historian, and he visited Bessler to examine his wheel around the 9th September 1714 in Draschwitz, scene of the second wheel's examination.

He records that "he allowed me, sometime ago, to carry out some experiments with his machine. It ran continuously for two hours in my presence and demonstrated considerable power." Later he writes, "I advised him to arrange a test in which his machine would be run for several weeks with all possible precautions taken to exclude any suspicion of fraud."

I have mention this because we know that Leibniz was certain that Bessler's wheel was of value and should not be lost to the world.  His advice to arrange a long running test was made during his visit and during the two hours I am sure that other suggestions were discussed.  For instance, building two sets of supporting pillars complete with a pair of bearing on each set, so that during the examinations the bearings could be thoroughly inspected for signs of fraud, both before and after changing the wheels over to a second set.

A demonstration of the lifting power of he wheel would also have been suggested by simply hoisting a heavy weight from the yard to the roof.  I also think the demonstration of an archimedes pump would have been discussed too, because mining was Leibniz's current research and anything which might be used to pump water from the many mines would have been a highly sought-after device.

The Draschwitz wheel measured 9 feet in diameter and turned at 50 RPM unloaded and its size might have been restricted by the ceiling height of the room, but I'm sure that Leibniz would have urged Bessler to build the biggest wheel he could, to generate the most power and that would have necessitated seeking the patronage of a prince such as Karl the Landgrave of Hesse-kassel or his cousin Moritz-Wilhelm, Duke of Zeitz, who had already viewed the machine.  They lived in castles with large rooms which would easily accommodate a larger wheel.

There was one more thing that Leibniz suggested; was there any way that Bessler might design the wheel to turn in either direction?  Such a feature would surely crush any  accusations of fraud.  It was this that occupied Bessler's time after the Draschwitz wheel was destroyed.  As we know he succeeded but even that surprising ability did not convince everyone.

Finally, the ultimate requirement would be to try to obtain the word of a trusted senior member of the ruling elite.  This would require Bessler to drop his obstinate determination to keep the secret of his wheel hidden from everyone and yet this should have answered all criticisms if he could find the will to do it.  In the end he agreed to let Karl the Landgrave into his secret and as history has shown Karl was regarded as a man of tremendous integrity, as incapable of breaking his word as he was of taking part in a fraud, with or without benefit to him of his realm.  Yet even this was insufficient!

One last thing; I mentioned the archimedes pump and certainly that was described on more than one occasion but it is not mentioned as part of the official examinations and the reason is this.  Arranging a large tank of water with the end of the pump submerged was quite achievable, but the archimedes pump is an inefficient device and the loss of water due to leakage would have required a constant procession of people with buckets to keep the tank filled sufficiently and there would have been a lot of water dropped around the device causing the floor to be wet and with so many people present would have led to water being spread to other areas outside the machine room simply by the passage of many feet!  There was enough damp in building of the era without adding to it.

JC

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My current status with regard to Bessler's Wheel

My wheel is approaching a  dénouement; either it works or it doesn't.  If it works then I will publish everything I have on it, including a video of it in action, on one or more of my websites; if it doesn't , the same goes, but without the video.

I'm currently transferring much of the text and drawings I have already completed, onto a website, but this will not go live until it's ready, which may take a while.  However in the mean time I will post on www.gravitywheel.com a message to the same effect and try to update it as things change.

The final publication will reveal details of the principle which provides the means to drive the wheel  through the  gravitational force, and in addition it will have many illustrations and explanations of many of the clues I have managed to discover and decipher, which confirm that the design is right. 

The website will contain the same information as the document I originally planned to publish in PDF format and it is taking me considerable time and difficulty to complete this double project, while also working to finish the wheel.  So I would ask that you please to bear with me as I struggle with the current technology which I use to be familiar with but have partly forgotten, I am 70 after all!  It may be a few weeks before it all comes together but I will post updates as and when I think is worth it.

The fact that I include the possibility that the wheel might not work should not be taken as a presumption that I am not 100 percent certain of the design.  I do acknowledge, however, that there are difficulties for me in manufacturing and assembling the various components in such a way that they work relatively frictionlessly and without interfering with each other unless required by the design to do so.  I know that Karl the Landgrave said it was a simple design and once you understand how it works, the overall concept is simple, but I have yet to see an equally complex design published on the BW forum.

So either way, once the web site is ready I will publish it.  I say this because I think the wheel will have been tested and proven or not, long before the website is finished, but if it is, I may not be able to announce it immediately.

JC

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We Can't All Be Right, Can We!

Just back from an excellent few days in Spain and I was unable to think of a subject to blog about so this is some thoughts I had on catching up with comments here and on the BW forum.

I read with tremendous sympathy and understanding, the numerous expressions of optimism, both here and on the BW forum, of all we glass-half-full researchers, experimenters and builders each on the verge of success and barely able to contain our utter excitement that it is all but in the bag.......only to find some minor problem that we must adjust before success crowns our endeavours! 

In each instance when I read the post I cannot help but think the writer's confidence is misplaced and they are doomed to failure.  That isn't me being mean and nasty, it's just that, as I'm sure is the case with others, I am equally certain that I have the solution and as far as I can see, it is definitely not the same as anyone else's.  There are numerous deliberately vague descriptions and they all look good, but they all have one failing - they don't work.  And anyway, surely we can't all be right can we?

This brings me to another point; I understand exactly how Bessler's wheel worked and why, and yet I sense in many reports that the writers don't actually know how Bessler's wheel worked and are still trying numerous variations all based on the simple OB wheel firmly rejected by Bessler.    I think we can assume after more than three hundred years of failure that that is a proven unworkable configuration.

I'm also surprised that people still design with eight weights and levers, why? We know the two-way wheels emitted the sounds of about eight weights landing on the side towards which the wheel turned. But that proves nothing; there could be double the number of components in those wheels, compared to the earlier one-way versions and why build the more complicated two-way wheel when the simpler one-way version must be easier? Or they might have been padded to reduce some or all of the critical noises that might have given a clue, or had additional sound producers to confuse. In which case I think it's better to try to work out how many you think are needed and ignore the supposed vague clues offered by witnesses.

I see the question of, what might the one word have been that Bessler was afraid might reveal the secret, has resurfaced on the BW forum?  To me it is obviously the number five.  He never revealed it but my goodness, he does show it encoded in so many places you'd have be blind not to see it has great importance.

My own efforts to finish the wheel have been somewhat delayed by my little trip to Spain but now I'm back and eager to get this thing finished.  I have no excuse for not finishing it and I am determined to do so as quickly as I can, subject to my crappy engineering equipment and skills! One problem I am in the middle of resolving concerns  a lever which is not falling quickly enough, but the answer is clear to me and I have to make an adjustment to its task and reduce the load on it by adjusting its gearing. This will have negative consequences, I am sure but I will cross that bridge when and if I get there.

Rereading the above, I can see how similar my expressed confidence in knowing the solution looks just like every other  person's belief in their imminent success.  I'm seriously considering sharing what I know with someone who I feel that I can trust unreservedly, just to get another opinion on my theory.  I have no doubt he will be convinced but then there is always that tiny area of doubt.  Am I deluding myself?  Probably!

JC

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More Musings

I have always said that Bessler used gravity to drive his wheel, and have been criticised for saying so. In discussions on the forum and here it has been pointed out correctly, that nowhere does Bessler use the word 'gravity'.  My response was to say that Sir Isaac Newton coined the word 'gravity' in his 'Principia', to describe the intrinsic 'heaviness' that everything thing of mass has, and in Bessler's day it had not yet become widely read nor well understood so he wouldn't have used the word anyway as it had not come into common usage.  However, since then I have come to realise that Bessler's description was entirely accurate and mine was technically wrong.

Gravity does not move, but it enables things to move under its influence, therefore it cannot be the driving force itself, but only the enabler.  In the past I have drawn an analogy between gravity and the wind.  But the wind is a force, unlike gravity. Gravity is an enabler as I said, but the wind is more accurately the result of differences in pressure resulting in air flow from high pressure to lower pressure.  The travelling air molecules impact on the windmill blades, and turn it.  Bessler said of his wheel, "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". So his weights formed the basic component of the wheel and they are analogous to the air molecules. Gravity which enables motion is analogous to the air pressure differences which are also enablers of motion in air molecules.

If gravity forms 'step one'', and the weights form 'step two', then varying air pressure is 'step one' and the molecules are 'step two'.

In the end it doesn't matter, many modern devices are inaccurately labelled, and no one worries about it.  'Internal combustion' engine is a more accurate term than 'gas' engine because it ascribes the initiating force correctly; 'gravity wheel' is vague but you do get the picture even if it ascribes the initiating force to gravity rather than the fall of a weight, due to gravity.

Currently relaxing in Spain, enjoying sunshine, swimming, walking and of course the odd glass of wine, beer and sangria - but not all at the same time!

JC

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"The Legend of Bessler's Wheel" - or, "The Wheel of Orffyreus".

I have replaced my usual blog with a brief account of the legend of Bessler's wheel as I will be away for a short period of time.  My apologies to my readers and I promise I will be back here as soon as I can manage it.

JC

The legend of Bessler’s Wheel began on 6th June 1712, when Johann Bessler announced that he had invented a perpetual motion machine and he would be exhibiting it in the town square in Gera, Germany, on that day.  Everyone was free to come and see the machine running.  It took the form of a wheel mounted between two pillars and ran continuously until it was stopped or its parts wore out. The machine attracted huge crowds.  Although they were allowed to examine its external appearance thoroughly, they could not view the interior, because the inventor wished to sell the secret of its construction for the sum of 10,000 pounds – a sum equal to several millions today.

News of the invention reached the ears of high ranking men, scientists, politicians and members of the aristocracy.  They came and examined the machine, subjected it to numerous tests and concluded that it was genuine. Only one other man, Karl, the Landgrave of Hesse-Kassel, was allowed to view the interior and he testified that the machine was genuine. He is a man well-known in history as someone of the greatest integrity, and  the negotiations between Bessler and Karl took place against a background in which Karl acted as honest broker between the warring nations of Europe; a situation which required his absolute rectitude both in appearance and in action. 

There were several attempts to buy the wheel, but negotiations always failed when they reached an impasse – the buyer wished to examine the interior before parting with the money, and the inventor fearing that once the secret was known the buyer would simply leave without paying and make his own perpetual motion machine, would not permit it.  Sadly, after some thirty years or more, the machine was lost to us when the inventor fell to his death during construction of another of his inventions, a vertical axle windmill.

However, the discovery of a series of encoded clues has led many to the opinion that the inventor left instructions for reconstructing his wheel, long after his death.  The clues were discovered during the process of investigating the official reports of the time which seemed to rule out any chance of fraud, hence the  interest in discovering the truth about the legend of Bessler’s wheel.

My own curiosity was sparked by the realisation that an earlier highly critical account by Bessler's maid-servant, which explained how the wheel was fraudulently driven, was so obviously flawed and a lie, that I was immediately attracted to do further research. In time I learned that there was no fraud involved, so the wheel was genuine and the claims of the inventor had to be taken seriously.

The tests which the wheel was subjected to involved lifting heavy weights from the castle yard to the roof, driving an Archimedes water pump and an endurance test lasting 56 days under lock and key and armed guard.  Bessler also organised demonstrations involving running the wheel on one set of bearings opened for inspection – and then transferring the device to a second set of open bearings, both sets having been examined to everyone’s satisfaction, both before, after and during the examination.

So the only problem is that modern science denies that Bessler's wheel was possible, but my own research has shown that this conclusion is wrong.  There is no need for a change in the laws of physics, as some  have suggested, we simply haven't covered every possible scenario in the evaluating the number of possible configurations. 

I have produced copies of all Bessler's publications, with English translations.  They can be obtained by clicking on the appropriate links on the right.

JC

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The putt-putt boat

The ideas floated for driving Bessler's wheel, other than using the force of gravity include some other, pretty off-the-wall ideas.

My favourite is the put-put boat.  It is a toy with a very simple steam engine without moving parts, typically powered by a candle or vegetable oil burner. The name comes from the noise made by some versions of the boats.

Technically it is a thermodynamic self-oscillating toy dating at least from the 1880s. The toy was very popular in the early 20th century, but is no longer readily available except on the internet probably because it must be made of metal, while most toys today are plastic.

The putt-putt works by heating (usually with a candle) an internal tank filled with water and   connected to submerged exhausts. It is usually easy to adjust the heat so that the water level will self-oscillate.

As water is alternately blown out and sucked in through the exhausts, the boat moves forward with a

noisy vibration that gives the toy its name.  Below is a typical example, not dissimilar to one I made when I was a kid.

There are no moving parts and only a candle to heat the water; brilliant!

THere are a lot of web sites dealing with the making of such toys among them this one http://www.sciencetoymaker.org/boat/ and of course wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pop_pop_boat

It has been suggested several times to me that Bessler found a way of adapting the technology to drive his wheel, but I came to the conclusion many years ago that it wasn't possible.  The nearest thing to this would be Ovvyus's ambient temperature changes used to drive it, and I remain unconvinced of that too.

JC

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Proof that the Experts have got it Wrong Again

While we continue to seek the solution to Bessler's wheel, and hopefully provide a new source of alternative, clean and free energy, the world continues to seek alternative energies too, but elsewhere.

A perusal of the latest news on the alternative energy front, reveals nothing new.  All systems are variations on obtaining energy from the sun, the wind, the tides, waves, low energy nuclear reactions and cold fusion etc..  There are few projects which create renewable energy, but in reality there is nothing new, they are just tinkering with the old favourites.  There are a number of improvements to batteries and an increasing number of hybrid engines that combine different energy sources, but in the end they all depend on the existing technologies.

There is not one credible professional organisation which is prepared to spend tuppence on examining the evidence of Bessler's wheel, and after 25 years of trying I have to accept that without a working wheel there is not a chance that anyone will even give passing consideration to looking at the evidence. It's kind of like a chicken and egg situation, will someone spend some money researching the claims of Johann Bessler and subsequently produce a working prototype; or will the wheel have to come first? Obviously the latter.

Having said that I have sometimes wondered if producing a proof of principle device will be sufficient to ignite development of the new energy source.   I know others have said that but having written it, I am still optimistic that the news of just one wheel turning continuously for a convincing length of time will hit the headlines in screaming letters 36 point high.

It is my belief that the wheel will prove of the greatest use but if I'm wrong, I still think it will be a novelty for years to come if only to prove that the scientists get it wrong more often than they would have us believe.  It will become number one on the list above,  the "bumble bees can't fly" myth, And in this case they've been wrong for more than 300 years!

JC

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My Progress - an update

My current, and I hope, final attempt to reconstruct Bessler's wheel, continues.......(perpetually?)

The base of the wheel structure is still provided by an MDF disc 2 feet in diameter, to which everything is attached.  It has been divided into five equal segments  This is according to my understanding of the information left to us by Bessler.  I know that many, or most maybe, believe that it makes no difference whether you have four, five or eight segments, but I understand why five is the minimum and why any more need to be odd numbered as far as space permits.

Talking of space, my mechanisms are composed from cannibalised parts from many, many failed previous incarnations, and in an effort to conserve the rapidly diminishing number of available parts of a suitable length, I tend to use the part which is closest to my current requirement.  The result is that the mechanisms on my latest project are a little larger than intended, so that they project beyond the rim of the MDF disc.  This is not a problem from a mechanical point of view although it lacks the finesse apparent in my previous constructions.  It means that I must add a little to the height of the axle supports so that the finished article will be able to spin unencumbered by the floor of the support structure (should it feel inclined to do so!). In order to enclose the enlarged mechanisms the MDF disc would need to be 3 feet in diameter not 2, and if it comes to reproducing a more attractive wheel, that is something I shall take into consideration.

Friction among some of the moving parts has occasionally been a problem, but I resolved it a long time ago by using stiff nuts, washers and bolts, so that I can adjust the tightness to the optimum level, allowing the joints to move freely but not too loosely.  I use small disc lead weights, about the size of an old English penny, which are normally used to make curtains hang properly, and they are ideal for the size of the mechanisms.  I stack them in 5s and sometimes more to provide the necessary weights.

My previous blog about making false assumptions was inspired by my own stupid assumption!  I had designed two alternative mechanical actions, one of which I rejected about three years ago because I thought it wasn't right.  The result was that my chosen action, the other one, did not produce enough lift quickly enough to generate continuous rotation.  At that time I had not discovered what I call the Bessler/Collins principle and even after I had defined it, I ignored the one I had previously dismissed, the rejected alternative, and continued to modify the action I had chosen instead because I thought it held the most promise.  Recently I discovered my error and it prompted me to urge people to be aware of unconscious assumptions which might be in error but not immediately obviously so.

So my mechanisms are almost finished, and there will be one more procedure to accomplish before I can mount the wheel on its bearing supports and then my fingers will be crossed for success (and my eyes and legs).

I would like to explain more about my wheel, but it's difficult to say anything more without risking giving away too much information, but I think that I am close to getting it right - but haven't I; haven't we all, been here so many times before?  Anyway I hope that this will work or that it becomes clear why it won't. Then I must decide whether to publish all yet or keep trying.

JC

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Beware of making False Assumptions - and an Update.

Having spent the last 50 years or so, trying to replicate Bessler's wheel, I still occasionally err by making assumptions which turn out to be wrong.   

In the beginning I began by drawing numerous sketches of how I thought Bessler's wheel might have worked.  I assumed, rightly in my opinion, that gravity was the provider of energy. I accept that most people deny that possibility because they assume, rightly in their opinion, that gravity cannot provide the energy for the wheel's continuous rotation.  That is an assumption based on what we have been taught, but I intend to prove it to be a false one.

Having eventually ruled out most of my sketches, I began building models of parts of the various designs to see if they did indeed react as expected, or assumed.  Usually they did respond in the expected way but sometimes they didn't or they could be made to alter the response by subtly varying the angles and lengths of the various levers I employed in my designs. So my original assumptions were again sometimes wrong.  And of course even when they reacted as expected they were no good for purpose!

Clearly, if we believe in Bessler's claims then there is at least one false assumption causing our failure to replicate what Bessler did.  After the model-building had failed to elicit the correct response by my many mechanical configurations, I slowly came to the conclusion that something we ought to know about this subject was missing or had been overlooked.

Eventually I worked out what had been overlooked and immediately found corroboration in one of Bessler's clues.  A short while later I found another clue supporting the same conclusion.  Since then I have found more clues in support of my conclusion.  This is the principle I have encoded at the foot of each blog for some considerable time.

Making the mechanism which takes advantage of the principle has proved very much more difficult than I expected, but I think I have it right now, and I'm going to finish it.  I feel a little like the guy who has stated that his wheel will work within days, for at least the last two years!  I found that I had made an error in reading one of Bessler's clues, not the one concerning the principle, but one that led me up the wrong path in small way.  Correcting this error has produced the results I wanted so I'm completing the model.

The point of this blog is to say, "beware of assuming something, anything, it may not necessarily always be the whole truth".

Bessler was worried that people would think his wheel was too simple and therefore not worth the price.  I guess he was thinking of the principle that allows it to work with gravity. I, too, am amazed that no one appears to have discovered this simple fact.  But although the principle may be simple to understand, the mechanical configuration it requires to operate it, is not so simple, although once seen it will be easy to understand how it works,.  But I still remain convinced that even studying the wheel in action will not necessarily lead to an understand of the principle itself.

One last thought; someone asked me if my so-called Bessler/Collins principle would be automatically detected by simulation software and included in its response and my answer is yes, there is no reason why it shouldn't be.  As long as the required parameters are included it will respond according to the principle. It's more of an observation than a principle, I just don't know what else to call it.

JC

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The Legend of Bessler's Wheel, or The Wheel of Orffyreus

I have replaced my usual blog with a brief account of the legend of Bessler's wheel as I am  currently too busy to devote time to writing.  My apologies to my readers and I promise I will be back as soon as possible.

JC


The legend of Bessler’s Wheel began on 6th June 1712, when Johann Bessler announced that he had invented a perpetual motion machine and he would be exhibiting it in the town square in Gera, Germany, on that day.  Everyone was free to come and see the machine running.  It took the form of a wheel mounted between two pillars and ran continuously until it was stopped or its parts wore out. The machine attracted huge crowds.  Although they were allowed to examine its external appearance thoroughly, they could not view the interior, because the inventor wished to sell the secret of its construction for the sum of 10,000 pounds – a sum equal to several millions today.

News of the invention reached the ears of high ranking men, scientists, politicians and members of the aristocracy.  They came and examined the machine, subjected it to numerous tests and concluded that it was genuine. Only one other man, Karl, the Landgrave of Hesse-Kassel, was allowed to view the interior and he testified that the machine was genuine. He is a man well-known in history as someone of the greatest integrity, and  the negotiations between Bessler and Karl took place against a background in which Karl acted as honest broker between the warring nations of Europe; a situation which required his absolute rectitude both in appearance and in action. 

There were several attempts to buy the wheel, but negotiations always failed when they reached an impasse – the buyer wished to examine the interior before parting with the money, and the inventor fearing that once the secret was known the buyer would simply leave without paying and make his own perpetual motion machine, would not permit it.  Sadly, after some thirty years or more, the machine was lost to us when the inventor fell to his death during construction of another of his inventions, a vertical axle windmill.

However, the discovery of a series of encoded clues has led many to the opinion that the inventor left instructions for reconstructing his wheel, long after his death.  The clues were discovered during the process of investigating the official reports of the time which seemed to rule out any chance of fraud, hence the  interest in discovering the truth about the legend of Bessler’s wheel.

My own curiosity was sparked by the realisation that an earlier highly critical account by Bessler's maid-servant, which explained how the wheel was fraudulently driven, was so obviously flawed and a lie, that I was immediately attracted to do further research. In time I learned that there was no fraud involved, so the wheel was genuine and the claims of the inventor had to be taken seriously.

The tests which the wheel was subjected to involved lifting heavy weights from the castle yard to the roof, driving an Archimedes water pump and an endurance test lasting 56 days under lock and key and armed guard.  Bessler also organised demonstrations involving running the wheel on one set of bearings opened for inspection – and then transferring the device to a second set of open bearings, both sets having been examined to everyone’s satisfaction, both before, after and during the examination.

So the only problem is that modern science denies that Bessler's wheel was possible, but my own research has shown that this conclusion is wrong.  There is no need for a change in the laws of physics, as some  have suggested, we simply haven't covered every possible scenario in the evaluating the number of possible configurations. 

I have produced copies of all Bessler's publications, with English translations.  They can be obtained by clicking on the appropriate links on the right.

JC

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My fame (or notoriety) has spread!

This is a slight diversion from the usual, but it is connected somewhat fraily.

My eldest grand daughter Amy, has bought a puppy, well he is almost full grown now at 17 weeks! He is a Vizsla - not a dog I'd ever heard of before, but a beauty - but she has called him 'Bessler'!  She has done this because out of all of our family she is really the only one who has consistently supported me and my strange obsession with Johann Bessler, (apart from my wife of course).

at 8 weeks

at 14 weeks!

17 weeks.

These dogs are rare, but there is a Vizsla community and coincidentally they meet once a week not far from where my granddaughter lives, so they all meet in the local park, and of course the question arises, 'why do you call your dog Bessler?' Amy then explains all about me and Bessler and his perpetual motion machine - and they are really interested, (according to Amy) and are spreading the word!  What a strange way to get known!

They are known as velcro dogs because they stick like velcro to their master (or mistress).  It has to be seen to be believed.  Any way Amy has just finished 4 years at Uni and starts her first post as a teacher at a school near here.. How good is that, for us to have a qualified teacher who believes in Bessler?

JC

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An interesting paradox - what is right?

I have spent most of my life researching the legend of Bessler's wheel and I am convinced that his claims were genuine, But even I, have on occasion wondered if I have been fooled by an accomplished swindler.  Could it be that, despite all the circumstantial evidence that seemed to show that the machine was genuine and nobody lied, actually one or more people did lie?  After all it is being constantly rammed down our throats that Bessler's wheel is and was impossible and we are all fools for being easily deceived.

To get to the truth, only two people need concern us; Johann Bessler himself and Karl the Landgrave of Hesse who saw the inside of the machine and confirmed that it was genuine.  How can we tell if either or both lied?

If Bessler lied then he was taking an almighty risk.   He had engaged the attention of several people of high reputation and standing within three Princedoms. In each case he requested and received official examinations of his machine in front of Ministers, Clerks of the Court and religious leaders and of course the ruling Prince or members of his family. Any hint of duplicity and Bessler would face imprisonment and possibly execution as a deterrent to others.  He stated in his Apologia Poetica that if he was found to have lied he should be beheaded.

To secure their territory against attackers, usurpers and law breakers, the Princes dispensed justice swiftly and violently. Executions were public spectacles involving cruel methods. In addition, capital punishment was not reserved solely for the most serious crimes. Death was the penalty for a variety of minor offenses.  Bessler must have believed that he would be executed if he was found to be lying, so it seems obvious to me that he only told the truth about his machine.

One form of execution popular in Germany was the breaking wheel.  It was also known as the Catherine wheel or simply the wheel.  'It was a torture device used for capital punishment from Antiquity into early modern times for public execution by breaking the criminal's bones/bludgeoning him to death. As a form of execution, it was used from "Classical" times into the 18th century; as a form of post mortem punishment of the criminal, the wheel was still in use into 19th-century Germany.'  I can imagine someone might find that means of execution highly appropriate! See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breaking_wheel

But if, for the sake of argument, we assumed he lied, how was he expecting to get his financial reward and leave without being arrested and thrown in jail?  He couldn't just run; the deal was that the buyer and the seller sit around a table and the purchaser puts a bag of money on the table and takes the wheel.  It seems to me that it would have been impossible for Bessler to leave without the wheel being opened and inspected and verified.  This thought must have been considered, before he went ahead with the negotiations.

All the above notwithstanding, if Bessler had lied then either he fooled Karl or Karl lied too.  Yet we know from well-documented history that Karl was regarded as an honest man of tremendous integrity.  He was in constant touch with the Kings of England, Sweden and Prussia, acting as an honest broker attempting to negotiate peace between these warring nations.  He was also known for his patronage of the latest scientific experiments.  He supported Dennis Papin in his steam powered experiments for several years and also financed a number of other fields of research.  This man was no fool and would have thoroughly scrutinised Bessler's wheel before giving it his approval.

So we know that Karl did not lie either, but let us again suppose that he did, just for arguments's sake. If Karl lied then he must have foreseen that at some point someone would offer to buy the wheel.  If the machine was a fake that fact would soon emerge and Karl would be found out, along with his accomplice, Bessler.  His reputation would be gone, his status as an honest broker ruined, his family the laughing stock of Europe.  It simply does not make sense.

We are left with a paradox; the wheel worked as Bessler claimed, but the laws of physics as they are currently understood say that it is impossible for a wheel to rotate continuously under the influence of gravity alone.  Bessler told the truth therefore the laws of physics are wrong on this point at least.

JC

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Bessler's Septagram/ Heptagram

When I described my findings on the MT 137 figure on my website at http://www.theorffyreuscode.com/html/mt_137_a.html
I showed how it represented the musical circle of fifths publicised by Johann David Heinichen, 1683-1729, a famous German musician who lived and worked in Weissenfels at the same time as Bessler.  See the first two figures below.  MT 137 on left, modern version of Heinichen's circle of fifths to the right

In part two of the same page of the website at
http://www.theorffyreuscode.com/html/mt_137_part_two.html, I showed how Bessler had included a hidden septagram or heptagram, which is a seven-pointed star drawn with seven straight strokes, and sometimes drawn inside a circle.  Deleting the black lines on the original MT 137, or circle of fifths illustration, as in the middle figure below, and redrawing them to skim the edge of the inner black circle produces a heptagram, as shown in the third figure below.   This geometric figure has numerous associations with occult and religious symbolism, but lack of space prevents those discussions here at this moment.

What I had not appreciated was just how difficult it is to draw a circle with seven equal divisions, and that means that the inclusion of the heptagram in MT 137 cannot be considered as a coincidence, but is deliberate.  A circle divided into seven equal segments has seven interior angles of 51.428571 degrees.  This makes it impossible to get an accurate measured angle and there is no system available using ruler and compass, although you can get an approximation by dividing the circumference by seven and walking a set of compaases around it, or simply dividing the circle into seven angles of 51.5 degrees. I drew a heptagram and tried inscribing a circle within it to match the inner circle in MT 137, it is not at all easy!

The two figures lend themselves to a simple code - draw the connecting lines from one point numbered 1 and then follow the logical progression clockwise or anticlockwise and you get, for instance in the septagram,
1 to 4
4 to 7
7 to 3
3 to 6
6 to 2
2 to 5
5 to 1 .  The same applies to the dodecagram using the numbers 1 to 12.

Curiously the sides of the Great Pyramid is said to have a slope angle which is close to one-seventh of a circle, i.e. 51.4°, so I guess a reasonable approximation could be 51.5 degrees.

The number 51.42857 contains six repeating digits of 1/7, and is the best-known cyclic number in base 10. If it is multiplied by 2, 3, 4, 5, or 6, the answer will be a cyclic permutation of itself, and will correspond to the repeating digits of 2/7, 3/7, 4/7, 5/7, or 6/7 respectively.

1 × 142,857 = 142,857
2 × 142,857 = 285,714
3 × 142,857 = 428,571
4 × 142,857 = 571,428
5 × 142,857 = 714,285
6 × 142,857 = 857,142
7 × 142,857 = 999,999

The last one, 7 times, is a surprise..  (found at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/142857_(number)  )

So another mystery beckons - why did Bessler include a heptagram in MT 137?  5 or 7 mechanisms?

JC

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Update.

Ok, so I'm not selling up and moving house after all!  We both admitted to each other that we didn't really want to leave this house and we have been unable to find one we like as much, so we've cancelled the sale.  No villa in Spain either, at least not until the wheel works!

My current build incorporates the principle I discovered two or three years ago, and it's proving difficult to get it to perform correctly.  I know it is in the right place and it operates as I think it should but it is not causing the weight to 'shoot up' quickly enough, as Bessler described it.  I feel confident that I will get the configuration right in time but now that I am free of the house-moving troubles I can get on with playing with variations on the leverage to generate enough lift to move the weight upwards quickly.  The speed of the lift will affect the wheel's speed - too slow and it will have a braking effect.
  

I have always insisted that there are five mechanisms, but it was interesting to learn that the sound of the Kassel wheel was described in a newspaper report as making seven or eight bumping noises.  This fits in with my belief that there have to be an odd number of mechanisms and therefore  includes the possibility of seven as described by me on my web site at

 http://www.theorffyreuscode.com/html/mt_137_part_two.html

Having said that, according to my own work on deciphering Bessler's clues, there are many more potential sources for various mechanical noises, and the seven or eight reported sounds must either be ignoring the lesser ones, or they have all been silenced in some way.  I note that the early wheels were remarkable for the amount of noise coming from them when they turned.  Bear in mind that Bessler said he had tried to dampen the sounds with felt on some occasions and this seems to lend support to the idea 

And another thing, Karl reported that the design of the wheel was very simple, but I am aware of the principle that permits the force of gravity to drive the wheel without conflicting with the laws of physics and  I do not think he could possibly have understood all of what he was seeing.  It would not have been at all obvious even to someone as intelligent as he was.  I suspect that Bessler showed him the internal workings without pointing out the particular features which make the wheel comply with the principle I mentioned earlier.  It will easily escape attention unless you know what you are looking for.

My wheel is quite complex, in that it has several components which interact with each other and it is this interaction which is causing me problems in finalising one perfect mechanism whose precise configuration I can transfer to the other four to produce an exact copy of Bessler's wheel.  Confidence is high!

JC

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How Many Ways might there be to Solve Bessler's wheel? Update.

It has been said many times that even when we solve Bessler's wheel, we won't know for sure whether it will be the same design as his. Perhaps this doesn't matter but it seems an unlikely conclusion to me anyway.  I have known the principle or trick, if you like, to the secret of Bessler's wheel, for  a couple of years and I am certain that the principle I'm referring to is a vital part of the configuration; without its use the wheel will not spin.

I also know that if I hadn't found it, I would still suspect that there would only be one way to make gravity able to drive the wheel and therefore whoever solved the problem would still require this particular specific principle to be incorporated in its construction.  So for his wheel to work, Bessler must have known and used the same principle and therefore anyone having to use this same principle would result in a duplication of Bessler's wheel. If you consider that for hundreds, perhaps thousands of years, man has sought the answer to this riddle, as far as we know, without success except for the once, there can surely only be one principle involved and therefore only an extremely limited number of ways it can be used - and maybe only one way.

I have give some consideration to potential alternative ways it might be used and I suspect that it might be possible to use it in a reactionless drive.  How this might be achieved using the principle I have in mind is beyond my engineering skills to make, although I have sketched some ideas.  When you consider that in Bessler's wheel you are attempting to convert the downward linear force of gravity into a rotational one, then it doesn't seem too big a jump to assume that you could reverse it and use a rotational drive to create linear thrust.  Of course I am fully aware that to date, no reactionless drive has ever been validated under properly controlled conditions but then neither has a gravity-driven wheel. It seems that a consequence of building either one would conflict with Newton's third law, (for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction), however the same principle which I think will work for Bessler's wheel should be available for use in the opposite direction and we are all working to prove Bessler's wheel because we believe it was genuine.  If the consequences of Newton's third law can be circumvented in one direction then it should also be possible in the other.

I guess you are asking, if I know the principle why have I not created a working model by now?  A reasonable question and I shall try to answer it.  I know and understand the principle and the reason why it will work, and I'm confident that everyone will agree with me when I explain it.  But finding out how to use it has proved more difficult than I imagined when I first found it.  I have over the last couple of years, through a combination of hands-on building, trial and error, and successfully teasing out the desired information from Bessler's drawings I have at last arrived at the correct configuration, and I am completing my final construction.  

My intention is to finish this model and - if it works - then I can finally publish the details.  If it doesn't work, I shall also publish the details of the principle and also the extracted information from the particular drawings I used. I'll explain how I arrived at my conclusions and let someone else carry it forward.  I will do this because I am certain that I have everything right, but who knows?  Perhaps the quality of my workmanship might result in a less than continuous motion.

I understand with the utmost clarity that the vast majority of readers here, will think I'm deluded and I don't blame you.  But, I am fed up with constructing endless stationary wheels and I want to share the only bit of real information that I do have, the principle!  But allow me, please to just finish this last attempt to build a working model.

The reason for my belated apparent haste after many years of procrastination, is because we are planning to sell our current home and buy a smaller one here and maybe a small villa in Spain, where we can try and avoid the miserable winters in England.   This means that my current project will suffer an extended hiatus  The house is being tidied up for sale and my workshop is suffering the same fate - being tidied up and all my work hidden away. If this one fails to rotate continuously and drive another device, then I will publish everything as video, digital and printed documents within the next few weeks.

JC

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What Secret Lies within Bessler's Portraits?

This is an interim blog which I decided to write concerning recent speculation about the Bessler portraits.

There has been much discussion about the two portraits of Johann Bessler.  Do they contain hidden information and what that information might tell us?

In extracting meaning from Bessler's portraits it can sometimes be helpful to try and put yourself in his shoes.  What information was he trying to convey?

Personally, I don't see how he could transmit sufficient information about how to reconstruct his wheel from anything he contrived to hide in his portrait or portraits, so what do all the apparent clues mean? I am expressing my personal opinion here and I have published what I have been able to discover about the portraits at
http://www.theorffyreuscode.com/html/bessler_s_portrait.html.and here http://www.theorffyreuscode.com/html/part_2_portrait.html and
also here http://www.theorffyreuscode.com/html/2nd_portrait.html

The only facts that we can reliably extract are the quirky finger gesture which seems to point at some hidden meaning and the odd writing below the portrait which contains some alphanumeric clues and some curious font variables, plus the objects within the portraits, some indicating memento mori, and of course there is the pentagon, but all of these details seem to lead us to a dead end.  These vague hints seem to point to some secret knowledge relating to the Freemasons, the Rosicrucians, the Jesuits or some other secret organisation.  They are definitely clues, but with this sketchy information it seems impossible to understand what he is trying to say. 

Approaching the puzzle from a different angle, I think that if Bessler wished to give us the information it, had to be in the form of detailed construction information in a separate place elsewhere, and maybe he designed the portraits to tell us where to look.

So where would we be likely to find the information that Bessler might be trying to point us to?Obviously the most important source would be drawings because a picture is worth a thousand words, but if its textual clues you want then you won't find a better place than his Apologia Poetica.  I have described some of my findings in my web site at 

http://www.theorffyreuscode.com/html/aps_chapter_55.html 

So somewhere in the design of the portraits lies a series of clues which may lead us to the source of the real secret - how to build a Bessler wheel..

JC

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Bessler 's Curious Hand Gesture

I had considered posting the subject of this blog on the forum but decided against because of its length.  I have no objection to anyone taking the suject to the forum for further discussion.

Many years ago I commented on what I described as the poorly drawn hands in the main portrait of Bessler.  I wrote this because to me the hands looked unnatural and were therefore not well drawn. Subsequently I believed that I had discovered that the particular arrangement of the middle and ring finger being pressed together while the other fingers were held apart was a secret method of recognition among the Freemasons mainly in formal portraits.  I thought that this was probably not too surprising given the apparent involvement of Karl the Landgrave in the Masonic brotherhood. The subject of Freemasons has come up from time to time and suggestions have been made that perhaps Bessler was a Mason.   If the house of Hess at Kassel was deeply involved in Freemasonry then there is little doubt that Bessler was either made aware of it, or learned of it while he stayed at Hessen-Kassel.

Coincidentally the man to whom Baron Fischer wrote, in support of Bessler's wheel, Dr Desaguliers, Sir Isaac Newton's curator of experiments at the Royal Society, was, himself a keen Freemason and was mainly responsible for the upsurge in membership all over Europe. However further research indicates that Desaguliers was not connected with Freemasonry until 1719 and did not induct anyone on the continent before 1731 so I think we can dismiss any connection of Bessler to Freemasonry, at least while he was at Hess-Kassel.   Neither is there any evidence that Karl the Landgrave of Hess-Kassel was a member and anyway, it was too early for his involvement, although several of his descendants were.

As for Ken's findings on the subject of Bessler's portraits, I am neither supporting nor dismissing his work on deciphering the meanings he claims to have found - I simply don't know..  

In the main portrait Bessler's middle and ring fingers on his left hand, are held close together and anyone who wishes to research the significance of this in a formal portrait will find a wealth of information about the use of this symbol by the Masonic fraternity.  But I think we can ignore that information for the reason I have given above, so why was it used in his case?

The symbols shown in the portrait; the skull, book and jar are commonly used in art to denote the passing of time and our ultimate death and the words Memento Mori are ascribed to the notion.  It means remember, we die.  In my web site at http://www.theorffyreuscode.com/html/part_2_portrait.html I suggested a link to Mary Magdalene, Venus and the pentagram, which I admitted was highly dubious speculation.  In fact the answer is more prosaic.  I think that in addition to the alphanumeric cipher, as described on my website www.theorffyreuscode.com the two Roman letter 'M's in the bottom line below the portrait stand for Memento Mori.


But that still doesn't explain why Bessler used the curious finger gesture.  Around the year 1578 in Toledo or Madrid, Spain, the painter known as "El Greco", created a painting that is now called "El caballero de la mano al pecho" -- "The man with his hand on his chest."  In this painting the fingers , of his right hand are displayed as in Bessler's portrait except that Bessler has them resting on a book.  Space prevents me going into detail  about the various speculations about its meaning, but you can read a good review of the painting and its associated ideas at http://www.darkfiber.com/pz/chapter1.html

I should also point out that dozens of famous, and infamous people have had portraits done in which their fingers have adopted similar positions including Newton and Hitler, some are obviously accidental due to the position of their hands against their hip or leg..

My own take from this with regard to Bessler is this.  We know that in later life he published documents arguing for the unification of the Christian religions. I assume he included Catholic, Protestant, Jews and the Jesuits.  He spent a period of time in Prague meeting frequently with a Jesuit priest and Jewish Rabbi, and I suspect that it was there that he learned of the the hand gesture which is a type of Jewish secret sign that was used among the crypto-Jews (i.e., false Christians) of 16th century Toledo to recognize each other, much like a secret masonic handshake.  Bessler's gesture may originate from there, or another theory has it that the gesture was recommended by St. Ignatius Loyola, founder of the Society of Jesus, the Jesuits, in his Spiritual Exercises? There are also a number of paintings showing the virgin Mary using the same gesture while feeding the baby Jesus   The problem with all of these is that they place the hand on the chest or breasts as in the above picture.

I can imagine that Bessler might choose to use the Marrano gesture as it is called, but why not place it on his chest?  It looks to me as though his left arm originally came diagonally towards his chest ending up either with the hand at his chest or near to it.  The current left hand looks almost like a disembodied part simply placed there at the last moment.  Perhaps he intended to place it on his chest and then changed it at the last moment.  I wondered if the reason for his change of heart (pun!) was due to the fact that Loyola required that the sign be made against the chest for each sin the believer had committed, and I doubt that Bessler would have wanted such a public display of his sins.

I should also mention that there is a medical condition which causes a similar positioning of the fingers and as an alternative, the ancient art of dactylonomy may require a similar finger positioning, although I haven't been able find that precise one!

Any suggestions welcome.

JC

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Would Millions of Bessler's Wheels Affect the Planet's Rotation?

Previously there have been discussions on the BWF about the effects of having numerous Besslerwheels around the planet earth, all spinning and generating electricity (I wish!) and it has been argued that using weights and thus gravity, to drive all those wheels, will affect the rotation of the earth.  I assume the thinking is that with the force of gravity being used to continually drop and raise weights all over the world, the energy it spends in doing that is removed from the total sum pressing on earth?  It seems that some people think this would result in a slowing of the earth's rate of spin with some other, so far undefined effects?

What would the force of gravity be doing if it wasn't expending energy on moving Bessler's wheels?   It would be pushing or trying to push everything within its scope into the earth.  If some things are already in or on the earth does it still do work?  Yes. Does it lose some of its force?  No, because it's continuous. If a weight is driven around in a wheel by gravity, the energy is simply transferred to another form, first rotational and then electricity and then whatever electricity is used for.

I do not have an opinion on the likelihood of this action resulting in an effect which can be detected, and I'm doubtful that any number of Bessler wheels would have any impact on the earth's spin.  In writing this blog it occurred to me that, no one has proposed a similar result being caused by the millions upon millions of rotating engines all over the globe throwing weights around and around and up and down. All those pistons being exploded up and down and side to side.  What about elevators? Lifts in tall buildings going up and down, apparently the world's tallest skyscrapers are set to double in height after an elevator company developed a new super-strong 'rope' to haul lifts to the top.   Would a mass of 3 tons accelerating up and down the tallest building ( quarter of a mile) multiplied many time have any effect?  Seems unlikely.

Trains weighing thousands of tons travelling in excess of 100 mph accelerating and braking, or just shifting their mass across the surface of the earth; aircraft taking of and landing, moving their weigh from a runway and spreading it onto the atmosphere while travelling at many hundreds of miles an hour.  Huge cargo ships and tankers loading up and taking to the seas, spreading the load which was concentrated on a dockside onto the ocean. Aren't these kinds of activities just as likely to effect the earth's rate of spin as a hundred million Besslerwheels all rotating 24/7?

So the one difference between all of the above and Bessler's Wheel is that the latter will be driven by gravity, although many people believe that that is impossible and there is some other force driving the wheels, and that then puts it in the same category as those mentioned above.

I do not know if the concerns expressed here are legitimate or not, but I suspect the wheels will be produced regardless, if their existence proves commercially desirable.  That of course is another question which has exercised us over the years, can Bessler's wheel be justified as a generator of electricity? My personal view is that it could be.  To use an old English proverb, 'necessity is the mother of invention'.  In the Oxford Dictionary the proverb has been defined as – when the need for something becomes imperative, you are forced to find ways of getting or achieving it. And that is the key; if all alternative forms of energy creation become too expensive, detrimental to the planet or us, or unavailable everywhere then some one will take Bessler's wheel and use the concept which allows it to work without violating the standard laws of physics, and build a useful generator which can supply sufficient electricity for each one's needs.

For me the answer to the question posed in the title of this blog is - no, not at all and even if it did,not in any detectable way.

JC

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Breaking Down the Wall of Scepticism.

I have been immersed in Bessleriana for so long that I have become accustomed to the idea that it will only be a matter of time before we prove that Bessler was right and it is possible to extract energy from gravity.  Suddenly I realised I had got too used to the possibility and had forgotten what a bombshell that news would be should it come true!

The reminder came because I was rereading through Sir Isaac Newtons 'Quaestions' notebook the other day, and came across his brief comment about how perpetual motion might be possible if you could somehow shield half the wheel from the effects of gravity, when I sensed a subtext in his note. He wasn't suggesting that it was possible, what he was saying was that one way to achieve it would require the invention of a material which was utterly impossible.  In other words he was implying that it was impossible and you would have to invent an equally impossible method to achieve it. So even my attempt to vindicate my stance by suggesting that even Newton considered perpetual motion might be possible, was flawed!

But I do not accept that it is impossible, because I am completely persuaded otherwise by the huge amount of evidence in Bessler's work, but it does demonstrate very clearly the monumental task we have in trying to persuade anyone else of our conviction.  Newton has achieved an almost God-like status, and his work is taught world wide.  Other scientists of the era have also defined physical laws which still stand today, and every scientist, teacher and in fact anyone with even a little education knows that Bessler's wheel violates some law and is therefore inpossible, so how come we few are so convinced that we know better, that we are prepared to go against the tide and do all in our power to prove 99 percent of the world's population have got it wrong?

Call it instinct, intuition, a feeling, a hunch, a sixth sense, a gut feeling - whatever it is, it has been in the mind of man for thousands of years.  There was a magnetic wheel design in 8th Century Bavaria, and a design for another  perpetual motion machine by Indian mathematician–astronomer Bhaskara in 1159.  There are hints that they were being investigated as far back as the Sumerians, 5000 years ago. Somehow, we just know that it is possible to create a continuously turning wheel powered by weights, and therefore gravity.  In Bessler's day the possibility was discussed by the intellectuals but most of those who understood the argument were swayed by those who said it was in violation of certain physical laws which could not be argued with. The mere fact that it was so hotly debated suggests that the idea went against man's intuition.

The sceptic's argument was logical and those who espoused it were unable to find a concept which would allow such a device to work.  Phillipe de La Hire (1614-1718)  wrote that 'one would need to find a body that was both heavier and lighter at the same time', as equally daft an idea as Newton's gravity shield - and yet there is a certain truth in the statements.  La Hire's reflects Newton's idea too. Either the object changes weight or the effect of gravity on it varies; the end result is the same, the  amount of the perceived weight alters.

There is a scientific consensus that perpetual motion in an isolated system violates either the first law of thermodynamics, the second law of thermodynamics, or both.  The only question is this; is gravity an external force or not?  To me it is obviously external.  All physical bodies of mass are attracted to each other by the 'action at a distance' phenomenon hence the force must be external to the wheel - no question.  We can therefore dismiss the 'scientific consensus that perpetual motion in an isolated system violates either the first law of thermodynamics, the second law of thermodynamics, or both'. That consensus does not apply here, a gravity-powered wheel isn't an isolated system.

In the end, simulations, learned texts littered with illustrations, lectures - none of them will persuade the hard-liners; only a working model will convince them that after 300 years Johann Bessler's claims were justified.

JC

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Would Bessler's wheel be patentable?

This question seems to have surfaced again recently and despite reading a lot of patent advice I am uncertain if I can answer the question asked in the title of this blog. What follows is my take on the issue but it is quite possibly erroneous in some aspects, for which I apologise.

Let us assume for the sake of argument, that a means has been found to produce a continuously rotating wheel, driven only by the force of gravity.  This has nothing to do with Johann Bessler's work.  It seems safe to assume that this would be patentable, in the USA and many other countries.

However, suppose someone should come along and announce that the wheel in question is an exact copy of Bessler's wheel, and therefore it could not be patented.  This raises two questions, firstly so what? Bessler did not patent it so it's fair game for someone else to patent, and secondly how do we know it is an exact copy of Bessler's wheel; everyone knows that he did not reveal the secret of his wheel, so  we can never prove or disprove that as a fact.

The decision on the first point may depend on the outcome of the second point.  If it was proved that the new wheel did in fact copy Bessler's wheel exactly, would that negate the possibility of patenting it?  Personally I don't think it would, even if it was proved that it was exactly the same design as Bessler's.  Look at a patent today; it covers every possible alternative reading of an invention.  It tries to cover all eventualities because the patent lawyer knows that the opposition will read everything in the patent to try to find a chink which he can use towards a new patent application.  Bessler's clues leave the field wide open for similar patent applications

The fact that Bessler left sufficient clues to allow someone to reconstruct his wheel exactly would not, in my opinion, be enough to make any future patent application invalid.  The clues, such as they are, are so obscure as to allow the formation of numerous designs which 999 times out of every thousand will undoubtedly fail due to the fact that he wrote them deliberately obscurely to keep them secret, and as I said recently, I think they were only there to allow him to point to them post the sale of his wheel, to show how devious and clever he had been.

I am aware of only two people who believe that they have solved most of the clues and are close to achieving success, and expect a working device soon, either simulated or an actual build - myself and Ken.  Having said that, in illustration of the difficulties in deciphering these clues, both Ken and I have arrived at our widely differing solutions via completely different sets of clues.

I should also mention that there are others who also feel that they are making progress in the right direction although I'm not aware of any soon-to-be announced working models.

This blog raises one more point.  It has been said many times, that even if somebody succeeds in making the continuously-turning wheel there will be no way of knowing if Bessler's wheel resembled it in any way.  I would reject that argument utterly, my own design has borrowed extensively from Bessler's work and while I am unwilling to share anything until I have finished it, I am confident of success, but does that mean that Ken's wheel will fail?  I have no idea, but I have made mine without any springs and that he will see as a major error.  LOL

Finally, should any of us succeed and knowingly base it on the information Bessler left in his clues, would it be morally wrong to patent it without acknowledging Bessler's part?

JC

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How will you choose a verifier of high repute?

Recent discussions on the Besslerwheel Forum have revealed a minor conundrum.  One member has assured us that his wheel works and as proof he will take a video of it running, albeit with covers over the sides to prevent us from seeing how it works.  As proof that the video is genuine he says that he will include other devices running at the same time. Leaving aside the question of trust, it seems to me that such a demonstration would prove pointless anyway.  If no one can see how the wheel works, how are they to judge it?  All that will be visible will be the speed and regularity (or not) of the spinning device. No matter how you try to prove the wheel is the genuine article there is no way to establish its validity unless someone can see it, understand how it works and vouch for it.

The question then arises, who might be the most suitable person to provide his assurance that the wheel is genuine?  It is critical that an independent examination is carried out by someone who has no personal interest in the demonstration and is seen to be impartial.  This rules out family connections, employment relations, patrons, friends, others with an interest in the device, potential buyers, financially interested people and the majority of members of the forum, including myself.  Obviously he would require expertise in the subject.

Johann Bessler had exactly the same problem.  He tried to prove the wheel did work as he claimed by demonstrating a number of tests that he and Gottfried Leibniz thought were compelling at least if not irrefutable.  He also sought the most reliable and trusted person possible, to validate his machine, a man of unblemished reputation and one held in the highest respect by other rulers and their subjects. Despite this, the modern world seeks to tarnish Karl the Landgrave of Hessen Kassel's reputation by casting doubt on his honour, trying, it seems to me, to find a chink in the armour of good solid, but circumstantial evidence in favour of Bessler's wheel.

At that time the most sensible suggestion was that another ruler hold a sum of money equal to the price Bessler demanded for his secret, in escrow pending the verification of the wheel.  An escrow is a deposit of funds, a deed or other instrument by one party for the delivery to another party upon completion of a particular condition or event.  That the suggestion failed was partly down to the chosen escrow holder taking offence at a related matter and partly down to the fact that Bessler did not trust anyone.

Even if the escrow arrangement had been accomplished, a reputable person would then have to be found who could verify or not the wheel's behaviour and then inform the escrow holder so that the money could have been handed over.  But one person of unimpeachable reputation had already given the wheel his seal of approval, Karl who insisted that he must verify Bessler's claims before agreeing to provide his patronage in the form of employment, room and board for Bessler and his family.

It seems to me that trying to do the same thing today would be just as fraught with difficulties as Bessler discovered. There will always be a feeling that some agreement has compromised the reliability of the verification.  There are however, some excellent forum members who I would trust absolutely, but perhaps like me, they would prefer not be involves in such an important role.

I should point out here, that I am completely against patenting the device because I think it's a waste of time and money.

JC

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Do we know, or are we Guessing, Speculating or do we have a Hunch about how Bessler's Wheels worked?

I sometimes wonder if Bessler had any qualms about publishing his Apologia Poetica and his Das Triumphans books.  Did he fear that he had provided clues that were too easy to decipher?  I know I am reluctant to give any hints about my current thinking for fear of giving anything away and I suspect most of us are of a similar mind.

However, I think he must have been pretty confident that the clues were too difficult to decipher otherwise he would never have published them.  But that raises the question are they too difficult for us too?  He must have thought that at some point people would work on his books in an effort to extract the original meaning he intended us to grasp; but that this should begin to happen three hundred years after his death was probably not something that occurred to him.

He published the books when he was at the height of his fame and confident that his wheel would be sold, in which case the books were just there to allow him to reveal that the clues had been there all along and only his own cleverness had kept them invisible.

I have been criticised in the past for publishing speculation without labelling it as such, thereby giving the impression that my speculations were factual. I hope I corrected that impression but I think there is a thin wall between what we think is fact, speculation, following a hunch and guessing.

Speculation is the consideration of some subject which leads to a conclusion or opinion reached by such contemplation. Often such speculations are impossible to verify, and one can say that it is the forming of a theory or conjecture without firm evidence.

Besides speculating, I have followed many hunches over the years most of which ended in a firm conviction that my hunch was wrong. Other hunches I chased have led me to believe they were correct or true, even though I did not have any proof.  Like all hunches these were based on a feeling or guess, based on intuition rather than fact.

Guessing combines elements of  hunches and speculation but is broader based.  For example you can guess the next roll of a dice but you can't speculate what it would be.  It won't be accurate at all because the dice has no memory of previous rolls, but you can speculate what the dice roll will be, based on, for example, looking at the statistical distribution of past rolls and so forth. But it just won't be very accurate.

So I think that speculation is an informed guess.   But a hunch is something extra; some unconscious conclusion about the way to the solution.  I often awaken in the night having had a sudden revelation about something I had been thinking about during the previous day or week.  Often it it proves unfounded in the cold light of dawn, on the other hand I have made some major discoveries which I was able to verify subsequently.

But some of the most interesting revelations have come to me as I was writing descriptions of my various discoveries. These have confirmed what I considered was hardly more than speculation at the time  and thus became facts.

So revelations can materialise out of the blue and I'm sure they stem from unconscious activity in a part of the brain which appears to be able to work unsupervised, independently and in a focussed way.

JC

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