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Author Topic: Clemente Figuera revisited  (Read 12329 times)
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Thought I would repost this from OU.com

Imightknow
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Very true, the Figuera device has nothing to do with the egg of Columbus other than it's shape.


The egg of Columbus analogy was not in reference to a shape or device but a concept.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Egg_of_Columbus

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An egg of Columbus or Columbus's egg refers to a brilliant idea or discovery that seems simple or easy after the fact.
Christopher Columbus, having been told that finding a new trade route was inevitable and no great accomplishment, challenges his critics to make an egg stand on its tip. After his challengers give up, Columbus does it himself by tapping the egg on the table to flatten its tip.


Another analogy is that everyone can find a problem impossible(trying to balance an egg on it's tip) but still have a very simple and obvious solution(simply flatten the tip). Implying that others did not understand the nature of the problem or read too much into it.

As such Figuera, like many other FE inventors, was claiming the technology was very simple and obvious but only after the fact. The solution only becomes obvious after a person becomes an expert on the subject or gains experience and insight into the nature of the problem.

Ironically, the egg of Columbus concept may apply here. Many assumed the egg of Columbus reference by Figuera may apply to complex shapes, coils or cores. Others assumed the reference may apply to Tesla's egg of Columbus device in 1893 demonstrating the complex interaction of induction and rotating magnetic fields. Everyone always tends to assume the most complex solutions but seldom the most obvious ones.

https://fs.blog/complexity-bias/
Complexity Bias: Why We Prefer Complicated to Simple

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“Most geniuses—especially those who lead others—prosper not by deconstructing intricate complexities but by exploiting unrecognized simplicities.”... Andy Benoit

AC


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Comprehend and Copy Nature... Viktor Schauberger

“The first principle is that you must not fool yourself and you are the easiest person to fool.”― Richard P. Feynman
   
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It is simple as KISS. Figuera just eliminated movement (well sort of), yet his generator behave exactly the same as ordinary generators. Just ask proper question about generators and the solution will appear as a KISS idea . Sorry, can't explain in detail, but you can figure it out
   
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Another member Hanon posted this brilliant link over at OU.com

https://figueragenerator.wordpress.com/my-interpretation/

I thought this was incredible and a good example of the quality research being done by others.

AC


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Comprehend and Copy Nature... Viktor Schauberger

“The first principle is that you must not fool yourself and you are the easiest person to fool.”― Richard P. Feynman
   
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  Followed the link to see what was said. This brings to mind what JB did with magnets on his motor/gens by putting the north/north. As he said it created a  nSn super pole between the two. Not sure that this would be the case here as the induced coils were between the two poles. Not knowing the size of the coils leaves me with doubt. The one thing I can say is that the super pole did in fact exist and was very sharp in shape.
  This design has been beat on for a long time and still none has replicated. At least not declared of the fact. From the patent, I see he had the coils in a straight line, the gent from Canada that  powered his MVO was in a circle and used a motor case.
  The short video showing NS and coil being slid back and forth made near nothing. NN did >4X for the same setup.
   Sooooooo. Coil geometry and a Arduino
thay
   
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That's a great article there thanks for posting AC.

There is a lot that can be learned from opposing magnets together, especially with the metal in the middle to allow them to come together. This was part of a side project I was doing while working for a company in Canada. You can create magnetic fields that seemingly appear to be sitting in "free space" and generate fields with much higher densities. This higher density field can be 'observed' with the effects from the video with the moving coil.
   
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Thanks for posting the link AC. It was very interesting.

I've decided to build a simple proof of concept to test the idea out.

In order to do that I need to be able to vary two electromagnets so that they are 180 degrees out of phase. When one is at maximum, the other will be at minimum. I also need to be able to pass a sizeable current through the coils.

I've just built some MOSFET driver boards that can switch 1700V / 70A. The problem is that MOSFETs can only switch on / off, and if you vary the voltage to the gate then the MOSFETs heat up and don't always switch on when you want them to. I needed to be able to vary the voltage smoothly from zero to maximum.

The solution I arrived at was to develop an SPWM (sinusoidal pulse width modulation) algorithm and control two outputs using a Teensy 4.1 board (600MHz Arm Cortex-M7), programmed with the Arduino IDE.

I've just finished testing it and it's working really well. I've tested it with two incandescent light bulbs running at a low frequency so that I can easily see if they are changing brightness smoothly and are 180 degrees out of phase.

The next step will be to replace the lightbulbs with two electromagnets and a coil sandwiched inbetween them, and then see if there is anything worth pursuing.
« Last Edit: 2023-03-28, 22:06:44 by lfarrand »
   
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This is my current bench, working with SPWM and two MOSFET driver boards.



Some videos:

Oscilloscope video showing SPWM using MOSFET drivers. Both signals are 180 degrees out of phase, so when signal 1 is at a maximum, signal 2 is at a minimum and vice versa.

The SPWM signals were generated on a Teensy 4.1 MCU (Arm Cortex M7 @ 600MHz) using hardware interrupts and an Arm specific Maths library to compute trigonometric (sine & cosine) and other floating point operations in realtime.

https://youtu.be/HKc9HpHCIug

Two bulbs flashing out of phase using SPWM from MOSFET driver boards

https://youtu.be/aNVvHgCGYso
« Last Edit: 2023-03-28, 22:06:59 by lfarrand »
   
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Two bulbs flashing out of phase using SPWM from MOSFET driver boards

https://youtu.be/aNVvHgCGYso

Nice-  but is the pattern a little off?  I think one should be maximum as the other is minimum.  Attached is a frame of your vid. 

Here is the Clemente commutator I made lighting car lights.  following the patent by the letter.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XEGMTaEpCks
   
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Nice-  but is the pattern a little off?  I think one should be maximum as the other is minimum.  Attached is a frame of your vid. 

Here is the Clemente commutator I made lighting car lights.  following the patent by the letter.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XEGMTaEpCks

Well spotted! Thanks for bringing that to my attention. I went back and took a look and it seems that the two signals are only 90 degrees out of phase rather than 180. I'll need to fix that by changing the sine wave generation for wave 2 to shift it 90 degrees (PI/2).

Wave 1: y(x)=cos(PI*x)
Wave 2: y(x)=sin(PI*x-(PI/2))

No doubt there will be more wrinkles that I need to iron out, but I think I've got a good foundation to build upon.

I enjoyed watching your video. It seems like we've got two very different solutions (mechanical vs semiconductor) that end up with roughly the same result (flashing bulbs alternately).

Are you eventually planning to replace those bulbs with coils?
   
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Lfarrand,

Great to see some experimentation going forward with this.

I have some feedback you might want to consider..

A 180° phase angle will result in two attractive poles being generated. A 90° will have one field be on while the other is off.

What we want is two opposing poles generated and only their relative strengths modulated. There shouldnt be alternation of the current direction, only modulation of strength.

The two waves would look more like

y(t) = Isin(At) + o
z(t) = Isin(At + pi) + o

I - current intensity
o - dc current offset
A - frequency

What this allows is modulation while maintaining opposing poles and net forward direction of current. Optimizing these parameters for your particular setup would be my aim.

I'm having troubles with my laptop rn but I can simulate in femm what the fields will do visually.
   
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Hi polyrhythm. Thanks for the feedback, it's much appreciated. I was using cos and sin before, but it makes sense to simplify things (for my simple mind) and use sin for both with the relevant phase shift for one of them.

I noted from the link that AC posted that it was imperative that the magnetic field not reverse direction, and it should only vary in intensity from 0% - 100%.

MOSFETs are designed to turn on or off, they aren't designed to vary the voltage level. I think you can do that by causing them to partially turn on when feeding the gate with a lower voltage, but this causes unwanted heat as a byproduct. Heat (power) dissipation is calculated as (voltage difference from Drain-to-Source) x (amperage flowing from Drain-to-Source). There is no current flow when the MOSFET is off, so no heat. There is also little voltage difference when the MOSFET is ON, so no heat.

Since a single MOSFET can only cause the voltage to be either 0V or supply voltage, it means that there is no negative voltage produced. This causes my SPWM waveforms to intrinsically have a DC offset so they start from 0V, which effectively shifts the max negative part of the cycle to 0V. This means that the magnetic field will not reverse direction because the current doesn't alternate.

I've revised the waveform calculations to be what you posted, except I don't need the DC offset since I get that 'for free' due to the way the MOSFET switch works.

I haven't used FEMM before, but I've seen references to it in other posts. Seeing the simulated fields would be very helpful, so if you fix your laptop and find some time then that would be a real help.

I'm using a 2D graphing tool called Desmos to visualize the waveforms. Here's a link to my graph with the out-of-phase waves.



Red is sin(x), blue is shifted by 90°, green is shifted by 180°.



A 180° phase angle will result in two attractive poles being generated. A 90° will have one field be on while the other is off.

Isn't the 180° shift what we're aiming for? Your formula references pi, which is 180°.
   
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Thank you for the clarification of how the MOSFETs affect the output waveform.

I can appreciate the confusion my post brought. You want a 180° AND an offset. Just 180° by itself produces attractive poles.

I will get to it asap..hopefully with a cool animation to boot. Maybe sometime early next week.
   
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Well spotted! Thanks for bringing that to my attention. I went back and took a look and it seems that the two signals are only 90 degrees out of phase rather than 180. I'll need to fix that by changing the sine wave generation for wave 2 to shift it 90 degrees (PI/2).

Wave 1: y(x)=cos(PI*x)
Wave 2: y(x)=sin(PI*x-(PI/2))

No doubt there will be more wrinkles that I need to iron out, but I think I've got a good foundation to build upon.

I enjoyed watching your video. It seems like we've got two very different solutions (mechanical vs semiconductor) that end up with roughly the same result (flashing bulbs alternately).

Are you eventually planning to replace those bulbs with coils?

Thanks Boss,

I got 2 models.  1 electronic with mosfets and one with the mechanical commutator.  I played with a few coil configurations, but seen nothing mind-boggling as of now.  Lots of variations to try..

Anyway, I will be keeping tabs on this thread..  Nice to see someone else actually build rather than all the jibber jabber from armchair engineers.

Do it up man!
   
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Thanks Boss,

I got 2 models.  1 electronic with mosfets and one with the mechanical commutator.  I played with a few coil configurations, but seen nothing mind-boggling as of now.  Lots of variations to try..

Anyway, I will be keeping tabs on this thread..  Nice to see someone else actually build rather than all the jibber jabber from armchair engineers.

Do it up man!

Thanks, likewise I think it's great that you're building and testing things out.

I've got a curious mind and I'm quite tenacious, which has served me well so far. It's all well and good sitting theorising, but I think at some point a practical experiment to test the theory and prove it either way is required otherwise you end up going round and round in circles.

I've placed an order for some 4kg reels of 1.60mm (14AWG) Enamelled Copper Winding Wire. The good thing about these is that they expose both ends of the wire, so I won't need to wind my own coils.

   
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I fixed the SPWM algorithm and it now looks better to me.

Here's a new video showing the two bulbs flashing: https://youtu.be/pY87KSv4ti4
   
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floodrod
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Here is the Clemente commutator I made lighting car lights.  following the patent by the letter.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XEGMTaEpCks

I would beg to differ and the picture below is of the real patent.

The only resemblance is that your device rotates and makes/breaks contact. In every other respect you have modified the patent and made it into something which cannot work as the inventor intended.

AC









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Comprehend and Copy Nature... Viktor Schauberger

“The first principle is that you must not fool yourself and you are the easiest person to fool.”― Richard P. Feynman
   
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floodrod
I would beg to differ and the picture below is of the real patent.

The only resemblance is that your device rotates and makes/breaks contact. In every other respect you have modified the patent and made it into something which cannot work as the inventor intended.

AC

??  Explanation???

16 poles, wired as the patent says, group of brushes that always touches at least 2 contacts.

What did I miss?

   
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floodrod
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16 poles, wired as the patent says, group of brushes that always touches at least 2 contacts.
What did I miss?

A better question is why you cannot see all the details you missed.

The patent contacts are very small at around 2 to 3 degrees of rotation while yours are very large at near 16 to 18 degrees. Your so far off the small spaces between your contacts are closer to the actual patent contact area. The large space between the contacts in the patent determines the duty cycle or percentage of on vs off time outside the two contact requirement. The duty cycle in any device is kind of important.

The patent also shows wire wound resistances having a roughly 1:20 width/length ratio, placed close to parallel to one another and turned 180 degrees mid point between connections. Where you saw fit to completely ignore all these details and install generic resistors.

As a general rule we should never change anything in a patent we are researching otherwise it's basically pointless. How would we know we haven't changed something critical to the patents operation when we don't know how it works?. Even if we did do everything exactly as the patent dictates I suspect there is still a good chance it might not work due to other missing details. So it's critical we make an effort to get everything correct.

AC


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Comprehend and Copy Nature... Viktor Schauberger

“The first principle is that you must not fool yourself and you are the easiest person to fool.”― Richard P. Feynman
   
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The large space between the contacts in the patent determines the duty cycle or percentage of on vs off time outside the two contact requirement. The duty cycle in any device is kind of important.
AC

Guess we are reading the patent differently. 

"brush “O” rotates around the cylinder “G” and always in contact with two of their contacts."

"ALWAYS"  tells me there is NEVER "Off-Time"..  Spacing makes no difference if the brush is ALWAYS touching at least 2 contacts.

Thanks or your valuable input- but No Thanks.

   
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floodrod
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Guess we are reading the patent differently.
"brush “O” rotates around the cylinder “G” and always in contact with two of their contacts."
"ALWAYS"  tells me there is NEVER "Off-Time"..  Spacing makes no difference if the brush is ALWAYS touching at least 2 contacts.

I think your confusing two different issues.
1)The brush size required to touch at least two contacts at once.
2)The contact size and spacing between contacts relating to the pulse timing.

Suppose we have 4 contacts 1-2-3-4
The brush touches contacts 1-2, then 1-2-3, then 2-3, then 2-3-4, then 3-4.
When the brush breaks with contact 1 it must be making 2-3 however there is a large gap before it makes contact 4. The large gap between the contact 3 and 4 is a timing function your commutator cannot have because there is almost no gap.

The real sequence based on small contacts should be 1-2 wait X time then make 3, 1-2-3 then break 1, 2-3 wait X time then make 4. 2-3-4 then break 2 and so on.

It well enough that you have done things differently just don't make false claims saying you were "following the patent by the letter" when you obviously didn't. Your commutator and resistors are not like those shown in the patent.

AC





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Comprehend and Copy Nature... Viktor Schauberger

“The first principle is that you must not fool yourself and you are the easiest person to fool.”― Richard P. Feynman
   
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Suppose we have 4 contacts 1-2-3-4
The brush touches contacts 1-2, then 1-2-3, then 2-3, then 2-3-4, then 3-4.
When the brush breaks with contact 1 it must be making 2-3 however there is a large gap before it makes contact 4. The large gap between the contact 3 and 4 is a timing function your commutator cannot have

It does it just fine actually.. 

"than the turning of a brush or group of brushes that move circularly around the cylinder “G”"

It Always makes contact with 2 regardless of the gap by using "A group of brushes" like the patent says..

Regarding the resistors, I tried air coils, chokes, resistors, and now am on transformers..  And I am getting somewhere..  When using transformers as the resistors and harvesting the secondaries, the transformers output more when I pull from the induced... 

Remember- it says ""Let be "R" a resistance that is drawn in an elementary manner to facilitate the comprehension of the entire system""
The drawing dumbed down the resistors so people understand the gist.

I think the part everyone is missing is :

 "whose current, after completing their task in the different electromagnets, returns to the source where it was taken."

Clemente was harvesting the lenz and directing it back to the source POSITIVE terminal (where it was taken).. 

You can see a beginning example here-  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Of_ZXdU2DLU&t=5s   When I short the induced coil, I harvest More from the transformers.. 

   
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duplicate post sorry
   
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floodrod
That is an interesting setup and your 3D print quality is very good. The brush setup must have been fun to balance and I see very little vibration.

It's also interesting that so many people could have such different interpretations of a single patent. Marathonman thought the resistance R was an inductance and used a rotary variac setup. You seem to have tried many different setups as well.

Quote
I think the part everyone is missing is :
"whose current, after completing their task in the different electromagnets, returns to the source where it was taken."
Clemente was harvesting the lenz and directing it back to the source POSITIVE terminal (where it was taken)..

I interpreted this part of the patent differently. Figuera speaks of attaching a source labelled (+) and (-) to the device but then claims once the device is running the source can be removed. In effect, the feeding current is removed making the device a self-sustaining closed loop generator with no apparent input source or battery.

Figuera...
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From this current is derived a small part to excite the machine
converting it in self-exciting and to operate the small motor which moves the
brush and the switch; the external current supply, this is the feeding current,
is removed and the machine continue working without any help indefinitely.

Quote
You can see a beginning example here-  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Of_ZXdU2DLU&t=5s   When I short the induced coil, I harvest More from the transformers.. 

Here a person needs to be careful and most have been down this road before. In most cases once we attach a real load like 100w light bulb everything goes sideways. I'm not saying it cannot work only that it's too early to tell because we would have to measure the actual input/output power (volts x amps) with a real load.

I have used something like this in the past, https://www.instructables.com/DIY-Power-Measurement-Module-for-Arduino/
If we have a newer DSO we can also use the power measurement firmware. I connect the voltage on one channel then use an opto-isolated hall effect current sensor for the second channel. Once we calibrate the current sensor (1 amp=1 volt) the DSO does the math displaying the power. In effect, voltage and current mean little separately and were interested in the power and energy(add time to calculate kilowatt hours).

Another trick we can use is dual pole dual throw relay(s) to switch between different power measurement sources. So we measure the device power input on our DSO then switch sources and measure the power output. If the device input/output has stabilized(buffered) or converted to DC we can use one DSO to measure power on multiple circuit legs.

AC


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Comprehend and Copy Nature... Viktor Schauberger

“The first principle is that you must not fool yourself and you are the easiest person to fool.”― Richard P. Feynman
   
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It does it just fine actually.. 

 and now am on transformers..  And I am getting somewhere..
 
 


Have to appreciate the irony….


Also: transistors may not be a bad replacement for brush gap timing.
As we can tune the duty cycle vs trying to replicate some random inductance a guy used way back when the alloy that particular wire was made from was actually in production.
or whatever. As if often the case with patent replication attempts. Take a simple block core transformer. They still look pretty much the same, but have entirely different fall off curves compared to our modern laminates.

the basic idea here is to keep the circuit flowing, while switching coils, right?
how we get there should be observed from as many perspectives as possible.
wether its a distributor, or transistors, or i’ll throw in solenoid contacts and a timing circuit.

The effect is what happens afterwards
   
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I interpreted this part of the patent differently. In effect, the feeding current is removed making the device a self-sustaining closed loop generator with no apparent input source or battery.

Yes it can loop by using the output coil as the source. But even so, the power taken from the output coil to power it needs to be returned to continue working.

Before I attempt a long-winded explanation no one will read, I will just attach a basic image for now. If there is interest, we could go over the details.

The machine works because it's simulates a sine wave in the opposite direction without reversing current direction.

It needs three coils because it beats lenz by harvesting the opposing magnetic field with the simulated wave.

The original patent was altered not to show the return path. But I'll give you a hint.  The extra six terminals of the zigzag resistor on the top were used in the real machine.

   
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