The Collins Conjecture

When a certain number of weights are attached in a particular configuration, each weight being capable of a limited range of movement, within the structure of a wheel which is able turn freely, a continuous imbalance may be maintained causing the wheel to rotate continuously.

"Conjecture" indicates a proposition which is presumed to be real, true, or genuine, mostly based on inconclusive grounds, in contrast with a hypothesis (hence theory, axiom, principle), which is a testable statement based on accepted grounds.

I shall refer to the above device as a ‘wheel’ for that is what it is and since it relies on gravity to move it continuously – a gravitywheel.

Two reasons are usually invoked to prove this conjecture wrong. One is that the law of conservation of energy prohibits it and the other is that gravity is a conservative force and cannot be used in this way.

So let us examine the two reasons why gravitywheels are regarded as impossible. Firstly although the law of conservation of energy is usually cited as proof of the impossibility of such devices, this law does not prohibit the use of gravity to drive a gravitywheel as defined above. Why? Because in this case the wheel is not an isolated system. If, for the sake of argument, we assume that such a device did work, then the wheel must obtain sufficient energy from somewhere to enable it to run continuously. Since there is obviously insufficient energy within the wheel, the energy must come from somewhere else. My conjecture suggests that the energy is provided by gravity which is an external force and there is a unlimited source of it external to the wheel. There is, therefore, no violation of the law of conservation of energy which, as I said above, would only apply if the wheel was an isolated mechanical system.

Secondly, gravity is a conservative force and as such, can be recognised in more than one way. For instance, in conservative forces, work done in moving an object between two points A and B is independent of the path taken between the two points. Secondly, potential energy can be restored to a conservative system after kinetic energy has been released as motion, by reversing the event. Potential energy is energy stored in an object. This energy has the potential to do work. Gravity gives potential energy to an object. This potential energy is a result of gravity pulling or pushing downwards. Put simply, the energy released as kinetic energy can be returned as potential energy by, for instance, replacing a fallen book on a shelf - and finally, a conservative force field is defined as one for which the net work done on an object in a closed path is zero.

The last phrase is curious and derives from the fact that work done by gravity is calculated by including a figure for the distance an object is moved vertically, disregarding path alterations by other forces. Taken to an extreme it leads to the conclusion that in a closed path the result will be zero energy used because in a closed path the distance from start to finish is zero. It is here that we find the apparently insoluble problem; in a gravitywheel each weight is operating within the confines of a rotating wheel, and will follow a closed path hence the conclusion that gravity wheels are impossible.

This odd phrase which does not relate to reality is constantly reiterated, i.e., work done in a closed path equates to zero - and yet the evidence of our eyes belies this. You can’t really achieve a closed path unless you can remove all friction and that would be a pointless exercise because you would not have spare energy for doing work. Of course that doesn’t happen in the real world. A weight can’t fall in a closed path, but it can orbit in a closed path on the edge of a wheel provided that something else contributes some additional force to assist it to close the path. However continuing this theoretical line of reasoning, if you could exclude all friction then in theory the weight could fall in a circle from twelve o’clock to twelve o’clock. What then? Would it make another fall and another one, ad infinitum? Yes it would and gravity would continue to expend the energy and yet apparently no work would have been done according to the definition which was ‘a conservative force field is defined as one for which the net work done on an object in a closed path is zero’.

The problem is that work is simply the application of a force over a distance and if there is no distance to measure we can’t calculate the work done. Force in our case is equal to the weight of the object so with no measurable distance we say no work was done. But if gravity is a continuous force then it must apply pressure to everything with mass all the time. If I hold a weight of ten kilograms at arms length eventually I shall become exhausted and someone else will have to take over. I could have a line of a hundred people ready to continue to hold the weight all day and night. The weight has not dropped but the force of gravity has continued to expend energy, yet the distance the weight has fallen is zero so it apparently did no work.

There is an oft quoted explanation that if the object is resting on a table for instance, the table is pushing back with equal force thus balancing exactly the gravitational force. To my mind this is as daft as the other suggestion that in a closed path no work is done. The table isn’t doing anything and neither is the wall pushing back when I lean against it. Yes it’s away of explaining the calculations for work done but in practical terms it simply isn’t true. What is true is that gravity is a continuous force surrounding and running through everything. Anything with mass, no matter how small, is affected by gravity. It moves with the force unless it is fixed to something which isn’t moving. The instant the object with mass is free to move, it falls again until it lands on another fixed surface. You can pick it up and let it drop as many times as you like. Why is that? Because gravity is a continuous force and that is a better description than a conservative force. So when we say that no work was done by gravity in forcing downwards the ten kilogram weight it isn’t strictly true. What we really mean is that because gravity is a continuous force with no apparent reduction in energy no matter how much work it does, it is ‘working’ all the time; it never pauses or diminishes, so it’s rather like a stream of water or wind, which is not diminished by the work it does. All the time it expends energy whether the objects it impinges on are falling or not.

To return to my argument. So conservative forces apparently rule out the possibility of a functioning gravitywheel. Although we are constantly told that gravity is a conservative force little is said about any other conservative forces. Electric force, magnetic force, spring force are offered as possible conservative forces but surely there are more, even though they are never included as conservative forces? The same applies to non-conservative forces. Friction is usually offered as an example but the basic difference between the two types of force is that you can’t store or restore energy in a non-conservative force. Unlike a conservative force the energy that a non-conservative force removes from the system is no longer available for kinetic energy. The other conservative forces which I mentioned seem to be ignored and the reason why is because of the vagueness of the definition of conservative force. I’ll return to the definition of conservative forces momentarily.

A current of wind or water can be defined as a conservative force even though each may originate from another source and fulfill a definition other than that of a conservative force. For instance a stream of water may come from a pump or from a higher level and a current of wind may flow from a high pressure area to a lower pressure area, or from an electric fan. But to a Savonius windmill, placed in the path of the wind, it, the wind, fulfills the requirements of a conservative force. You can measure the distance the wind moves something, ignoring any other forces or friction that might effect the path. You can store and restore potential energy for use as kinetic energy. Both forces satisfy the requirements of the definitions of conservative forces in a particular location. The source of the wind and water is irrelevant; we only need to know how it effects things locally. We don’t know everything about gravity but we can still observe it and describe its effects here on earth.

Both the above two forces, can be used as conservative forces, to drive machinery such as windmills and, water turbines In fact it is only because they have the same features as a conservative force that they can be used in this way. This begs the question; if wind and water forces can be defined as conservative forces and they are used to drive machinery why can we not use the best known conservative force, gravity, to drive gravitywheels?

It has always seemed odd to me that the definition of a conservative force relies upon our methods of measuring it, rather than a full description. I would describe it as a continuous force; yes it has the features described in the definition but nowhere does it say is continuous. Picture the force of gravity as a field which is continuously moving downwards towards the centre of the earth. All objects subject to gravity are embedded within this field. By this I mean that the objects move with the field unless they are held back by the fact that they are stationary, on a shelf, fixed to a wall or resting on the ground.

Now let us, in our imagination, turn this field on its side so that it flows horizontally like a river. The objects are now balls, floating in the water. The balls are carried along from point A to point B by the current of water, but some balls have been anchored by string to posts fixed to the river bed and cannot move. As soon as they are released from their anchorage, the balls flow with the river. When anchored they have potential energy; they have the potential to flow with the river. I could pick up one of the balls from point B, say, and take it out of the river and carry it up stream and release it into the water again at point A, where it would flow along with the current back to the point B from where it was removed. I could do this as many times as I liked and the water would always carry it back to the same point B. This analogous to picking up a fallen book and replacing it on a shelf.

Alternatively I could take the ball back to point A, not by carrying it but by leaving it in the stream and pushing it against the flow of water. Again as soon as I released it the stream would carry it back from Point A to point B again but I would have had to do extra work in moving it against the stream. This is analogous to the work done by a pendulum which has to overcome the force of gravity during its upswing.  In this instance the stream is acting in the same way as a conservative force. It satisfies the definition of a conservative force at that place and at that point in time.

The potential energy is stored in the ball when it is at point A, but not because the energy has been conserved but because it is continuous. It is not an isolated system and it is a system with a continuous flow of energy, i.e. water.

Another analogy; imagine a conveyer belt such as you see in supermarket checkouts. On the belt I place a bottle of tomato sauce. When the belt moves it takes the bottle with it. The belt represents gravity. If I hold the bottle back it stops but the belt continues to run. When my hand is removed the bottle is able to move with the belt again. I can push the bottle back to the beginning of the belt, and this is just the same as picking up my fallen book and replacing it on a shelf. The potential energy spent when the book fell was used up as kinetic energy but was replaced as potential energy again when replaced on the shelf, and it is exactly the same as the belt which carried the bottle forward from the beginning again. This analogy shows the action of gravity in its simplest terms and demonstrates that it is a continuous flow of energy enveloping everything which has mass and carrying it along with itself.

So far then we have argued that just because gravity is a conservative force does not of itself prohibit a functioning gravitywheel, but this does not answer the question about why a closed path appears to prohibit gravitywheels. The answer is astoundingly simple.

All of this discussion and all similar calculations work with one weight because it is assumed that more than one will not effect the result. However let me raise some questions:-

Have you ever tried to ride a bicycle with only one pedal? Have you ever seen a water turbine with one blade? Or an anemometer with one cup? Or a Savonius windmill with one blade? Or a ships screw with one blade? Or a propeller with one blade? I could go on but you get the point. You cannot argue that a gravitywheel with one weight cannot work because it has to move through a closed path. You have to include more than one weight. What do windmill sails do if they don’t follow closed paths? Or any of the other examples mentioned above? They all have the same features; two, three, four or more design features which take advantage of the stream of energy or conservative force creating an imbalance on one side of the centre of rotation. All designs follow a closed path and all rotate. Dependent on the force being tapped they may have curved paddles, curved sails, or curved blades which offer increased resistance on one side of rotation and reduced resistance on the other. Or like the bicycle pedals, instead of varying the resistance on each side of the rotation the variation is achieved by increasing the force on one side and reducing it on the other. The effect is the same even though the method is different.

Admittedly some windmills and propellors have an axis which is horizontal to the direction of the force rather than the vertical axis of a savonius windmill or an anemometer, but that does not even rule out the possibility of a gravitywheel which interacts with gravity via a horizontal axis. The horizontal axes work with conservative forces equally well although the Savonius windmill is less efficient than the traditional horizontal ones.

In summary then, there are conservative forces which are used to drive machinery directly. By ‘directly’ I mean there are no other interfaces between gravity and the wheel other than the weights themselves; no mountain streams or reservoirs, re-windable weights on chains, springs etc., etc. Therefore the argument that gravitywheels cannot work because gravity is a conservative force, is nullified.

So now we have a chink of light through which we can start research into gravitywheels and get it legitimised. The law of conservation of energy has been satisfied. The conservative forces are working with us. The closed path is not a barrier after all, where do we go from here?

Johann Bessler also known as Orffyreus, built just such a machine only he called it a perpetual motion machine, albeit somewhat grudgingly. This was in 1712, nearly three hundred years ago, and yet in all the intervening years no one has managed to duplicate his machine. Probably it is just as well otherwise we might not have had the benefit of all the steam engines, combustion engines, and electricity that have kept us so busy. But now both oil and time are running out. What better time for the resurrection of Bessler’s gravitywheel than now? Cheap, free to run and clean!

After some thirty years of research I am satisfied that Bessler’s machine worked. I’m also certain that it depended only on gravity and required no other input such as has been mooted in magazines, books and the internet. Furthermore I can provide the strongest circumstantial evidence in the inventor’s favour. Lastly I have discovered and deciphered numerous coded clues about how his wheel worked which are scattered throughout Bessler’s publications. Now is the time to research gravitywheels as the energy source of the present and future. Details about Bessler can be obtained from my other web site at http://www.free-energy.co.uk

Copyright © 2008 John Collins.