On Jun 19, 12:15 pm, "Allen" wrote:
An engineer at the University of Florida has unveiled a design for a "flying
saucer" that can take off vertically, hover, and fly, and it has no wings or
propeller -- it doesn't have any moving parts at all. "This is a very novel
concept, and if it's successful, it will be revolutionary," said Subrata
Roy, the ship's inventor, who applied for a patent on it last week. "If
successful, we will have an aircraft, a saucer and a helicopter all in one
embodiment." The saucer is propelled by a force called magnetohydrodynamics,
which is created when a current or a magnetic field is passed through a
fluid. By interacting with the atmosphere, the force is able to create lift
and momentum and provides stability against wind gusts. The ship's surface
is partially hollow and continuously curved, like an electromagnetic flying
bundt pan. Unfortunately, it seems the technique is likely to work better in
space, where pesky things like gravity and drag are minimized.

The Japanese built a ship in the '80s using that propulsion
technology. No moving parts in the water; just a tunnel with some big
electrodes. I have heard no more about it; I thing the efficiency
losses are too big. Current flowing through seawater electrolyzes and
heats it, and there goes wasted energy. How does this guy get current
to flow through air?
Another lab built a small flying model using electrostatic
lift back in the 60s. It couldn't lift anything but itself and a few
feet of wire that led to the power source on the floor. It had pointed
electrodes on little posts mounted on but insulated from a screen
below; the posts were negatively charged and the screen positive, and
tiny amounts of current travelled via charged air particles from the
posts to the screen. The charges were not enough to cause sparks, like
lightning. The very light air movement generated lifted the device.
Again, far too inefficient to be useful.
When I was a kid magazines like Popular Mechanics and Popular
Science and Mechanix Illustrated had articles every month on
"Revolutionary" aircraft designs and wings and engines for cars and
airplanes and boats and so forth. They're still printing articles like
that. As kid I read all of this for years and when I grew up I still
saw the same old piston engines, four-wheeled cars, airplanes using
those old piston engines and the same old airfoils we've used for 75
years, and ships with propellers and either piston engines or steam
turbines. All old technology that refuses to go away. Even the modern
car is still using the same piston-connecting rod-crankshaft-camshaft-
valves arrangement that Henry Ford used, just with computer-controlled
spark and fuel controls that break down and cost a fortune to fix.
Nothing really revolutionary, 40 years after all those magazine
articles trumpeting the new stuff just around the corner. Kinda makes
a person more than a little skeptical when Le Chaud claims to have
better ideas, see? He has no idea how many of his ideas were already
invented before he was born.
I think there's more chance of antigravity technology being
developed. A lab has achieved a 4% reduction in gravitational force
above a rapidly spinning superconducting disk. Five or six yeras ago
already. Part of the problem is that no one really understands
gravity, and no one has been able to conclusively link it with
electromagnetism and the two nuclear forces, so until we figure it out
it'll be hard to create something that defeats it. And that's
annoying, seeing that even the weakest magnet can pick up something
against the feeble force of gravity.
The fuel pump in the tank of my car has now quit, and a new one
is $400 or so. The little car gets 42 mpg. The 1962 VW Beetle that was
my first car, got 45 mpg. The 1951 International pickup I restored,
and in which I put a Ford 300 six-banger, gets just under 25 mpg, much
better than most brand-new pickups are getting these days. It has a
$25 mechanical fuel pump and a carburetor with a manual choke. The
ignition uses points and a condenser, and when they get worn they'll
tell you that they're worn but they'll keep going until you get home
and won't stop dead in the middle of the freeway. Just what did all
this electronic stuff get us?

Dan