Sunday 15 November 2015

More of Bessler's numbering clues in ‘Das Triumphans’.

After the two illustrations discussed in my previous post I have decided to offer my findings in another of the illustrations; this time the ‘Andere Figura’ and the ‘Secunda Figura in ‘Das Triumphans’.  Again I am discussing the numbering used in them.  I have placed a copy of the drawing below.  Again a single click on the picture will bring up an enlarged version so you can see the numbering more clearly.



The first thing to note in the pictures shown above, is that the right side of the left picture has been truncated slightly. In the book they are separated by a small gap filled with thin black and white lines, clearly designed to allow for the inner margins being partially enclosed by the book binding.  These lines allow you to bring the edges of the two illustrations close together as shown above.


In the drawing above you can see that the left circle can be completed and joins at the circumference of the right circle.  Notice that the circle I've drawn in, does not follow the original one as it leaves the left page.  This is due to the page being pulled inwards at the central binding which has slightly deformed the printed circle.  I always thought that the two pages were intended to be joined and I tested the theory with my original copy of  DT, by pressing the pages flat with a piece of glass and adjusting the right page until the thin black and white dividing lines were hidden.  It was then possible to draw in the complete circle to show that it did indeed abut the right circle.  As a check, note that the left half of my added circle aheres closely to the original one and that it only diverges as the bend in the paper aproaches the central crease.


In the above picture you can see yet aother pentagram inside the left picture. Notice how the extension of one of the chords of the pentagram runs through the middle of the right picture. This extension to the pentagon is governed by the close proximity of the two pictures so one must assume that the extension is intentional.  The main supporting pillar forms a perfect angle of 72 degrees with the extended chord, thus indicating the rotational angle of a second pentagon.  



I've included the additional pentagram in the above picture, which may seem more speculative and I must admite that although it looks possible, I have found it difficult to draw in a perfect pentagram so please add a pinch of salt to this particular suggestion.

In the right side picture above, the large triangular pendulum has some curious properties which seem to be additional clues.  They are 30 degrees for the bottom angle, and 78 and 72 degrees for the upper left and right angles respectively.  The 72 degree angle obviously fits in with the hidden pentagon, but is there an additional clue there?  Of course!

The second thing is that the right picture seems to have an excess of the number eight (four).  This over-labelling looks suspiciously like the same technique I have described for the two first wheel pictures.  Could this be another indication of a grand total being sought?  

Yes - the numbers in the left picture add up to 28; those in the right, 62, to total 90.  There are 15 numbers used and 90 divided by 15 is six.  But this does not seem to be a significant number, however Bessler’s favourite number 5, divides exactly 18 times into 90 – 5 and 18; the ubiquitous pentagonal numbers again.  Secondly the numbers used, 1 to 10, add up to a total of 55 – the other Bessler number. 

JC

 10a2c5d26e15f6g7h10ik12l3m6n14o14r5s17tu6v5w4y4-3,’.

Saturday 7 November 2015

Some of Bessler's Wheel numbering clues described.

This is a brief account of the odd numbering used by Bessler in labeling his two wheels, the Weissenstein one from Grundlicher Bericht and the second one the Merseberg wheel from Das Triumphans. For simplicity I shall refer to them as the W wheel and the M wheel.

By the way, click once on either illustration to get a large version to see the numbering more easily.





It becomes quite clear that some of the items are ‘over-numbered’.  By that I mean that Bessler seems to have labelled the parts with a particular number more often than one might think was necessary. For example the main pillar supporting the wheel is numbered 4, four times.  The slimmer pillars are numbered 12, and two of them to the left are numbered twice each, yet the other two are only numbered once each. Some numbers appear more often than others and not just because they are attached to more similar pieces. After number 18 the rest of the numbers are lone examples. I speculated that this was done to achieve a certain total, and having identified each part once with its number, he then sought to add to the total by labelling the same parts more than once. Obviously the higher numbers would make the jumps toward his desired total too big so he started at the lower end of the range and gradually added numbers until he had achieved his desired end.  Why he did this was unclear to me at the time.

In the W wheel there are two number 18’s yet one has been omitted in the M wheel – error or deliberate anomaly? In the W wheel the number 5 is barely visible in the box at the bottom of the sideways-on wheel, yet it has clearly been omitted in the M wheel.  In the W wheel some of the weights at the ends of the pendulums are numbered 11, there are eight of them, yet in the M wheel one of them has been omitted.  Finally in the W wheel there are two number 24’s attached to the padlocks, yet in the M wheel one of them has been reversed to become 42.  How can we explain all these anomalies?

The omission of 5 and 18 in the W wheel is explained by the fact that 5 is the most important number to Bessler because of its importance to the pentagram, and 18 degrees is the basic angle of the pentagram.  Changing the number 24 to 42 can be explained by the omission of 18, because 42 - 24 = 18.  Bessler ensured we got this information by altering the second drawing.  First he removed the 5 and an 11 (5 x 11=55).  Then he assumed that we would compare the two drawings and realize that the second one not only omitted these two numbers, but also when totalled the numbers add up to 633, whereas in the M wheel the total is 649.  But of course 633 from 649 equalled 16 (5 + 11).

In the first drawing the numbers, composed from 59 numbers, add up to 649, which is, interestingly, equal to 59 x 11 (both prime numbers).  In the second drawing the numbers add up to 633, which is 16 short of the 649.  In the second drawing the numbers 5 and one of the 11s has been omitted, which is why the second drawing does not match the 649 of the first drawing.  In both drawings the picture cuts off the left hand end of the drawing and in the process cuts off one of the number 11 weights.  If, in the first drawing, this is added to the 649 of the first drawing it produces the number 660, and because we then have 60 numbers, 660 divided by 60 equals 11, but more interestingly, 660 divided by 12 equals 55!  The same applies to the second drawing but you have to add the extra eleven to make 660.

JC

 10a2c5d26e15f6g7h10ik12l3m6n14o14r5s17tu6v5w4y4-3,’.

Tuesday 13 October 2015

" 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.  I'm currently unable to maintain a daily/weekly blog due to commitments which are keeping me exceedingly busy/  Hopefully the situation will return to a more amenable status and I can return to sharing some of the many clues I have deciphered and applied to my continuing efforts to reconstruct Bessler's wheel

JC       15th October 2015


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

10a2c5d26e15f6g7h10ik12l3m6n14o14r5s17tu6v5w4y4-3,’.

Monday 5 October 2015

Some of Johann Bessler's Clues shared and discussed.

I believe that I am running out of subjects to write about on this blog, so I have decided to bite the bullet and follow suggestions which might hopefully make this blog more interesting.  Obviously the whole reason for this blog was to write about Johann Bessler and his clues and the latter have been markedly absent, for which I apologise.  Blame the lack of discussion of clues on my paranoia! Afraid that I will accidentally give the game away and lose out to someone else?  Yes and yet what if I should die tomorrow?  All my work would become as nothing - which of course it might still do, but at least others will get a chance to decide for themselves whether I am completely nuts or perhaps I do have something to share.

All I ask is that I get credited with any of the ideas discussed here which it can be seen, clearly originated here.  I have a copyright notice at the bottom of this page but some people do not seem to recognise the requirements this places upon them.  Having said that, please feel free to discuss my ideas anywhere, just be fair and credit me as the author of them.

The first and most important clue for anyone who does not know is that the drawings in Das Triumphans, those done by Bessler, plus the one in Grundlicher Bericht and of course the Apologia Poetica wheel provide you with 90 percent of what you need to construct Bessler's wheel, BUT... each clue is skillfully camouflaged.

In addition the most vital piece of information without which your wheel will remain as stationary as mine has, is to be found in the text of Apologia Poetica, again cunningly disguised.  Despite my inclusion of a clue of a textual nature, most of those clues remain undeciphered despite identifying many, and obviously illustrations, no matter how cunningly contrived, hold the best hope of understanding what Bessler wanted us to see, and I shall include illustrations in future posts

Almost from the beginning of my first encounter with the legend of Bessler's wheel, I thought that the inclusion of the drawings in Das Triumphans, seemed strangely irrelevant and quickly came to the conclusion that they had another purpose, that they contained information about the mechanisms inside the wheel, but cleverly disguised - and so I began to compare them.  The number and succession of anomalies quickly grew and seemed disconnected, but then I realised that Bessler used multiple methods of disguise but by isolating them I eventually exposed two, different methods of concealment, which seemed to act in confirmation of each other.  Others followed in confirmation of this technique, but so slowly that it has taken me almost my whole life to get to grips finally with his system.

I have spent the least amount of time studying Maschinen Tractate simply because it was never published, although clearly it was intended for publication.   I have written about any findings I have made in Maschinen Tractate on my other websites, although the Toys page has given me some insights which I haven't shared to date but will do so soon.

Specific clues will follow but for those who have not visited them my web sites at http://www.theorffyreuscode.com/  and specifically the chapter 55 in Apologia Poetica  contain some of the clues I have identified and to which I have added my speculations

The clues discussed here in this blog will be only those I know are correctly identified and whose meaning has been clearly revealed.

JC

10a2c5d26e15f6g7h10ik12l3m6n14o14r5s17tu6v5w4y4-3,’.

© 2015  John Collins All Rights Reserved

Monday 21 September 2015

Johann Bessler was Born 100 years Too Soon!

Johann Bessler promoted his wheel as a solution to flooding in mines and also for pumping water for use in 'Gentlemen's pleasure gardens' and other uses in various manufacturing processes.  It has been suggested that Karl might have been considering the wheel as a means of returning the water to the top of his famous water cascade. In fact it is extremely unlikely that he harboured such thoughts given his years overseeing the experiments of Denis Papin which concerned a number of steam-related inventions.  He was familiar with the shortcomings of such constructions and it is doubtful that he thought Bessler's wheel was capable of pumping anything without the aid of steam or some other unrelated discovery. The unpleasant truth is that Bessler's wheel would not have been capable of providing a solution to either the mining problem nor the cascade and would have been of limited use to the other suggestions.  At that time it would just have been a novelty.  Today we see potential in a number of areas, particularly in the generation of electricity, which opens up its potential to an enormous degree.

In spite of the above negative aspects there were plenty of rich princes who would have paid a lot of money to have the machine to display to their visitors.  Andreas Gartner's whole life involved designing and building intricate machines for the entertainment of his wealthy patrons, for which he was well-paid, so I think Bessler could have sold his machine if only he had found a way to negotiate a settlement .

By making it drive an archimedes screw Bessler hoped to demonstrate its potential as a pump, but in reality it isn't a pump so much as a water lifter, and a limited one at that.  They were used in Holland to assist in draining water from land and everywhere for irrigation, but they were man or animal-powered.  Nevertheless, I think he might have had a market there, where low lifts were needed.   

Karl's cascade measured  almost 600 feet in height and it needed about 92,000 gallons of water to flow from the Hercules monument at the top all the way down to the big lake by the castle, where a fountain pumped water over 160 feet into the air. This whole system relied on natural pressure from reservoirs at the top of the hill and underground pipes whose locks were opened manually.  Once the reservoirs were empty the cascade dried up, so could only be operated occasionally once they were refilled by rainfall.  One can see the potential benefit of finding a way to return the water to the top but I don't think even today there could be an easy or cheap solution, and certainly not with an archimedes screw!

Today during the summer, twice a week the cascade is allowed to run for a few minutes.  That is to conserve enough water for another display of the cascade,in case of drought, and the same applied in Karl's day.

The competitor for Bessler was Newcomen's beam engine which was first run about 1714.  This machine devoured coal ravenously and produced huge clouds of smoke but it did work and many mines installed them.  It drew 10 gallons of water per stroke and ran at approximately twelve strokes a minute, so pumped about 120 gallons a minute, good for draining mines but obviously still inadequate for Karl's cascade.  A rough calculation suggests it would take about 64 hours of continuous pumping to replenish 92000 gallons and that would only lift the water a quarter of the height needed.

Newcomen's engine could pull water up from a depth of about 140 feet,   Bessler's wheel attached to an archimedes screw was limited by the length of the screw, a few feet.

So Bessler's wheel could have been little more than a novelty at the time but not so today and were he here he could rightly ask for a trifling £100,000 and more for the secret and the machine.  He was born too soon, but what if he had sold the wheel?  For several years it would have remained a toy-thing of the rich, but eventually someone would have taken hold of his wheel and attached it to an electrical generator and history would have been made - perhaps Michael Faraday in 1821, would have recognised the potential in Bessler's wheel and made the connection.

JC

10a2c5d26e15f6g7h10ik12l3m6n14o14r5s17tu6v5w4y4-3,’.

Monday 14 September 2015

Could Bessler's Wheel be made More Powerful than we Thought?

Here is a little hypothesis which might generate some discussion.  Many people are convinced that Bessler's wheel will never be more than toy; a novelty, with insufficient power to be of any practical use.  I disagree; I am convinced that a way will be found which makes Bessler's wheel a really valuable and practical alternative to the current methods of generating electricity.

Let us suppose that Bessler's wheel has been solved and we have the working model available for all to see, on the internet.

If the wheel is driven by weighted levers in a special configuration, any attempts to squeeze more power out if it will be limited by the confines of the wheel, and the mechanism.  Lengthening the levers to get more drop will only result in some additional height being required to raise them again - a no-win situation.  Increasing the size of the weights will also be self-defeating because they too will be harder to lift again. Depending on which configuration we use there may be other possible increases incorporated but still, they will have to be paid for in one way or other.  But perhaps there is  another way to increase the power output?

Suppose the output of the successful wheel is very small, as many have suggested both here and on the besslerwheel forum, how can we increase it? Assume that the wheel produces just enough energy to rotate itself continuously and lift a relatively light weight.  If we add another wheel to the same axle, we shall double the output, because the second wheel will simply add its energy to the first one which is already rotating the axle.  

Why not add ten wheels to the same axle, each wheel adding its own small energy to the total?  In other words mount ten wheels each containing five mechanism (or however many you believe were contained within the wheel) on to the axle to create up to ten times the original power output.

This, it seems to me could be a real method of increasing power. Bessler himself stated in his Apologia Poetica that "I can, in fact, make 2, or 3, or even more, wheels all revolving on the same axle", so I suggest that was in his mind when he wrote it.

No need to increase the number or size of the weights or the levers, just build several Bessler's wheels in series all on the same axle.

JC

10a2c5d26e15f6g7h10ik12l3m6n14o14r5s17tu6v5w4y4-3,’.

Tuesday 8 September 2015

How did Bessler Build his Wheel?

As I have said before, I use a disc of wood to attach the various mechanisms and the whole is mounted on a slim axle, but this is not the answer that Bessler could have used.  My method results in a flimsy construction incapable of carrying out the tasks Bessler's did.  His method required the construction of a framework as depicted in my original biography about him., see below.

In my original sketch I included eight divisions but things have changed since then.  In the first place I envisaged, and still do, two separate wheels, one a mirror image of the other, designed to turn the Kassel wheel in either direction.  There might therefore have been a need for only four radial struts; one set for each direction that the wheel turned.  Subsequently I proved to my own satisfaction that there were in fact five mechanisms operating inside the wheel and therefore five radial struts required for each direction of the wheel.

The initial framework might have stopped at the half way point, as shown in the illustration above, allowing access easily to the areas close to the axle.  The rest could have been added later to complete the construction. I read somewhere, but I forget where that the thickness varied from 15 to 18 inches on the Kassel wheel and I have shown why this might have been necessary above right.

The axle makes an interesting study.  Six inches in diameter and six foot long; using a wood weight calculator I found the weight to be estimated at between 50 and 100 pounds dependant on whether it was pine or oak, and there are many other possibilities using other woods, but the weight is significant.  There must have been some kind of support for the axle before he even began, unless he used a vise to support it and hold it still.  A hundred pound axle would be a heavy object to manoeuvre around and I think it likely that he made a work-bench designed to hold it in position while he worked on it.  But the six foot radial arms would become a problem because it would need the support structure to hold the axle six feet above the ground, otherwise the ground would interfere, unless he then added to the final section of each radial arm at a later stage., so I lean towards the three foot segments as the way to begin work on it.

Another thing is the positioning of the three-quarter inch bearings.  Any one who has had a bike will be familiar with the way the wheel can become wobbly.  How Bessler managed to build his wheel without any reported wobble because the wheel was slightly out of true was an achievement in itself.

How were the radial struts attached to the axle? Perhaps he used dowels sunk into the axle and subsequently used them to provide an attachment.  Or maybe there is a clue in the two drawings below, taken from his "Das Triumphans.."


The square box-like structure lends itself as a means of attaching to an axle.

Just some thoughts about the problems he faced building such a large structure on his own.

JC

10a2c5d26e15f6g7h10ik12l3m6n14o14r5s17tu6v5w4y4-3,’.
 

Sunday 6 September 2015

Update on wheel, moving house, clues etc.

I really enjoyed the contributions to this blog and the previous posting, so feel free to continue on this one. 

It has been suggested that perhaps my wheel is already running and that I'm holding back the secret for some nefarious purpose, but the truth is so much more mundane. I recently put my house up for sale and as anyone who has done this knows, the place must be kept immaculate at all times for any potential purchasers to view it at its best.  Consequentially my workshop has been tidied and my wheel hidden - I don't want any snoopers to see what I've been working on!

After a week the house was sold and I assumed that after eight weeks or so we would move out - wrong, the buyer changed his mind and backed out!  I had just got the wheel back out, but now its back in hiding again and the house is back on the market and we await another series of house viewings.  Until it is sold we cannot move to Spain.

In addition my beloved mother-in-law is having to sell her little bungalow to fund her remaining days in a nursing home.  She's 93 and can't do it herself so guess who's getting her house ready for sale?  Yes it's me again, getting two houses ready for sale and  hoping to buy two more, one here and one in Spain!

So any revelations about my wheel actually working will be on hold until I can get to work on it again, but I am continuing to write up the details and will publish as soon as I have finally tested this wheel.

In the previous comment section it was suggested that we would not know if we had actually discovered the secret of Bessler's wheel rather than an alternative method of  achieving the same result as he did.  I have said this many times now but in response I will just say that my proof that I have discovered his secret relies totally on his clues, and they are not mere interpretations but a series of physical undeniable pieces of evidence.  The proof is not dissimilar to a series of logical argument put forward by a lawyer in a  court of law - or the chain of evidence published in support of a medical conclusion.  We will know if we have Bessler's secret.

Also my claims that the number 5 is an important part of the Bessler wheel is routinely dismissed but I can assure you that is it a vital ingredient.

Finally I fear that I sound just like Ken and Oystein, and yet I have little or no knowledge of their clues any more than they know of mine, can all three of us be right?  My feeling is that Oystein has genuine knowledge although whether it refers to the wheel's structure or relates to some other matter, I have no idea.  For me Ken's code is harder to see, impossible in fact, for me.  I placed what potential encoding I could find in the portraits on my website at http://www.theorffyreuscode.com/html/part_2_portrait.html and also at the other portrait link on the same web site, it was not helpful in my opinion, but we are each convinced of the efficacy of our own pet theories and maybe we will each turn out right, after a fashion.

JC

10a2c5d26e15f6g7h10ik12l3m6n14o14r5s17tu6v5w4y4-3,’.

Wednesday 26 August 2015

Perhaps the mechanism is not so simple.

Karl the Landgrave is on record as saying that the secret of the wheel was so simple a carpenter's apprentice could make one, if he was allowed a little time to study it.

In the eighteenth century skilled  craftsmen traditionally employed children from a young age, 12 or 13 usually, but sometimes as young as 7.  They were indentured in a legal document  which bound the child to the master for seven years or more.  He provided board and lodging in return for free labour and also provided skill training which would ultimately permit the apprentice, upon leaving his master's employment, to set up on his own in a similar craft. So in Germany at that time the freed apprentice would usually have acquired all the necessary skills to operate successfully, by the age of about 21.

I think that Karl's words might have given the impression that the skill required to reproduce Bessler's wheel was scarcely higher than that possessed by the ordinary person in the street.  He was a ruler, a statesman and a politician and therefore commented in front of others of a similar standing, and chose his words carefully, knowing they would probably be reported by visiting dignitaries. 

I think he would have responded to questions about Bessler's wheel as noncommittally as possible and when asked how complicated the wheel was, would have considered his response in his customarily careful manner.  So, he chose to use an apprentice as an example, that being of less experience than a freed carpenter; less experience but still with four or five years expertise to back him in his  in attempt to copy the wheel.

I saw a documentary on child labour recently, and the skill demonstrated by kids as young as nine or ten in assembling electrical items, polishing gems, extracting precious metals from scrap electronics was eye-opening.  I see no reason to support the notion that, just because Karl appeared to be slightly denigrating about how simple the mechanisms were, should not fool us into thinking the secret to assembling Bessler's wheel would be easy and not involved complex configurations.

I mention this again, because my problem in assembling the parts I've made for Bessler's wheel are difficult to arrange without accidental clashes between different components.  But gradually by rearranging them over and over, I am getting there.

JC

10a2c5d26e15f6g7h10ik12l3m6n14o14r5s17tu6v5w4y4-3,’.




Monday 24 August 2015

Law, Theory, Hypothesis or simply a Fact - which is it?

I thought I'd post this but I may still return to the previous blog afte a few days, unless something else occurs to me.

A brief aside in one of the posts on the besslerwheel forum, gave me pause for thought.  When someone comes to a reasoned explanation for Bessler's wheel, without having actually made a working model, that explanation might be termed a hypothesis, however the three terms, hypothesis, law and theory have similarities and may overlap in places.

I found the critical feature that enables gravity to work on weights so that they cause the wheel to rotate. I called my discovery about why Bessler's wheel did not break any physical laws, a principle or an observation.  I read that a hypothesis is an educated guess based on an observation. So it might be a hypothesis, but apparently a hypothesis can be disproved, but not proven to be true.  I can prove my hypothesis is correct so it can't be a hypothesis.

A scientific theory summarizes a hypothesis or group of hypotheses that have been supported with repeated testing. A theory is valid as long as there is no evidence to dispute it. Therefore, theories can be disproved.  So my discovery can't be a theory because it can be proved and it can't be disproved.

A law generalizes a body of observations. At the time it is made, no exceptions have been found to a law.   As my Bessler-Collins principle lies within the scope of an existing set of laws it is already covered and cannot be a law on its own.

So my problem is this; I have reasoned an explanation for why Bessler's wheel worked and how.  The principle which I have called the Bessler-Collins principle still escapes a valid definition.  I can prove it works both by describing it with illustrations, and by physically making a testing model which performs as predicted.

Fact: In science, an observation that has been repeatedly confirmed and for all practical purposes is accepted as “true.”  So it is just a fact, an observation or a description of something that is well-known but has so far escaped everyone's noticed, or as I think Bessler put it, 'I found it where everyone else had looked'.

JC

10a2c5d26e15f6g7h10ik12l3m6n14o14r5s17tu6v5w4y4-3,’.

Thursday 13 August 2015

Update here and on www.gravitywheel.com

This blog will temporarily cease to post blogs.  The reason is that I am currently extremely busy and trying to get my wheel finished, my new website finished and a new publication finished.  All of these things will be published in the next few weeks but for now I am removing the comments feature because I am not posting blogs so there is nothing really to comment on. 

My house in the UK is for sale too, and once it's sold we intend to buy a small villa in Spain and also a small house here so that we have a bolt-hole here in the UK for when we return which we shall do every few weeks.  The house and garden are too big for us, there's only my wife and I here, so something smaller and easier to manage will be good.

I will update this blog from time to time but the comments part is closed for now.  I have also put a notice on a temporary website at www.gravitywheel.com and that too will be updated occasionally.  So for now I shall repost the basic story of Bessler and hope that I do not lose any of my friends who have kindly come with me on the journey so far. I will be back soon!

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

10a2c5d26e15f6g7h10ik12l3m6n14o14r5s17tu6v5w4y4-3,’.

Monday 10 August 2015

An Update and a Window on my Intentions..

I have been asked many times, "where is the wheel we were promised?" for, goodness knows, how many years now.  Well I think (hope) the answer is close.  As all of us who build wheels have experienced that, we know feeling, the solution is 'in sight' and 'confidence is high', only to find that we were wrong and success is as far away as ever.  So, as I have said many times during the last three years, and have even encoded a brief summary of it at the foot of each blog, I do know the secret to Bessler's wheel and I have been trying to design it into a working wheel.  I have finally decided to publish everything and to time it with the finishing of the wheel. My wheel is almost finished.

At the same time I have completed a detailed description of the basic principle, as a PDF file, and included some of the many clues which support the Bessler/Collins principle. A full description of the design is also included with numerous illustrations showing how I used many of Bessler's clues. I have also almost finished my new website which also provides some of the same clue details as are shown in the PDF file, however there are too many to include all of them on my web site.

I have not used, nor am I even aware of the many clues apparently encoded in Bessler's two portraits which apparently hold information on the construction of the wheel.  No, my clues lie elsewhere and will be accepted immediately they are linked to the Bessler/Collins principle.

My plan is to try to finish the wheel in the next three to four weeks, and then dependant on whether or not it works, I shall publish the web site with or without a video showing the wheel spinning. I know that the video on its own will be insufficient for those who cannot be bothered to read the explanation which will be available both as a digital document, and on the websites, so I shall have to leave it to others to check my work. Without the video an animation would be preferable. to nothing.

Of course, in a perfect world I would like to present a finished and working wheel, but although the concept is simple enough,  I have found it quite difficult to build it on a flat disk. With hindsight I would have been wise to build it three-dimensionally if you see what I mean. The levers swivel on thin bolts and because of their (the bolts not the levers!) limited length this means there is a very shallow depth for all the parts to move through without interfering with each other. The bolts are not connected at their other ends to another disc so the whole structure is liable to flex and this causes many problems. Still, with a little finesse (such as bending any levers whose action might be obstructed by another part!) I think I can complete the wheel and have it working. Of course another solution would be to find a skilled engineer who would be prepared to build it for me according to my design, while keeping absolutely silent about it. It would also be good to find a skilled animator who could make an animation showing exactly how everything works, alas I know of no such people.

It is true that I have had offers in the past and they are prepared to make such an animation but then it turns out that they are not really the professional or skilled amateur that I seek, but rather people with the best of intentions with some limited skill and experience but not enough for my needs.  I have seen animations that look so real they could be simply a video recording,   Also there have been offers to build my design for me, but in this case I need someone who lives close by and with whom I can visit and work with, but again these kind offers have come from other countries and such long distance communications do not appeal to me.

So I think peraps it is nearly time to publish all of it and sit back and wait for the reactions. 

JC

10a2c5d26e15f6g7h10ik12l3m6n14o14r5s17tu6v5w4y4-3,’.

Monday 3 August 2015

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

10a2c5d26e15f6g7h10ik12l3m6n14o14r5s17tu6v5w4y4-3,’.



Sunday 26 July 2015

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

10a2c5d26e15f6g7h10ik12l3m6n14o14r5s17tu6v5w4y4-3,’.

Monday 20 July 2015

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

10a2c5d26e15f6g7h10ik12l3m6n14o14r5s17tu6v5w4y4-3,’.






Saturday 4 July 2015

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

10a2c5d26e15f6g7h10ik12l3m6n14o14r5s17tu6v5w4y4-3,’.

Wednesday 24 June 2015

"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

10a2c5d26e15f6g7h10ik12l3m6n14o14r5s17tu6v5w4y4-3,’.

Monday 22 June 2015

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

10a2c5d26e15f6g7h10ik12l3m6n14o14r5s17tu6v5w4y4-3,’.



Thursday 18 June 2015

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

10a2c5d26e15f6g7h10ik12l3m6n14o14r5s17tu6v5w4y4-3,’.



Sunday 14 June 2015

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

10a2c5d26e15f6g7h10ik12l3m6n14o14r5s17tu6v5w4y4-3,’.

Monday 8 June 2015

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

10a2c5d26e15f6g7h10ik12l3m6n14o14r5s17tu6v5w4y4-3,’.


Wednesday 3 June 2015

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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Tuesday 2 June 2015

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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The True Story of Bessler’s Perpetual Motion Machine.

On  6th June, 1712, in Germany, Johann Bessler (also known by his pseudonym, Orffyreus) announced that after many years of failure, he had s...