Skip to Content.
Sympa Menu

homestead - Re: [Homestead] Solar-Powered Buoyancy-Driven Heat Engine

homestead AT lists.ibiblio.org

Subject: Homestead mailing list

List archive

Chronological Thread  
  • From: Don Bowen <don.bowen AT earthlink.net>
  • To: homestead AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [Homestead] Solar-Powered Buoyancy-Driven Heat Engine
  • Date: Sat, 16 Jun 2012 11:43:18 -0500

On 6/16/2012 9:13 AM, WILLIAM JONES wrote:
The device sits on a pond, allowing the air in each bottle to cool during
each cycle. So when sunlight strikes the top bottle, its float inflates,
causing the device to tilt over, exposing the next bottle to the
sun.http://home.earthlink.net/~clanl/buoyancy.gif

In the seventies several devices like this were tried. The most successful used Freon but none were really useful. Mother Earth News built one that used propane tanks. A sun heated lower bottle would boil its contents which would move to the opposite bottle. The heavier bottle would cause the wheel to turn. The problem was the speed of the wheel, it was very slow, so slow to not be useable.

At the same time experiments were made using a steam style piston engine using Freon heated by the sun in coils in the roof. It worked but again the heat transfer speed was low.

The laws of thermodynamics cannot be violated.

--
Don Bowen KI6DIU
http://www.braingarage.com/Dons/Travels/journal/Journal.html





Archive powered by MHonArc 2.6.24.

Top of Page