Tom Vales Expirement Presentation

Tom vales came to our class to explain us the function and how works the the Peltier Device, Stirling Engine,  and the Mendocino Motor. Tom vales is an engineer that works with the electricity department of Suffolk University , He has become very popular because he know how to build this devices  and also he helps a lot of students with their science projects. In his presentation he taught us that these machines are able to produce an efficient amount of energy.  In this blog it will be explained how does this machines work.

 

The Peltier Device

In 1834, Jean Charles Athanase Peltier discovered that two unlike metals kept at a difference of temperature generates energy.

The Peltier effect has a lot of technological potential. It is very reliable, and since it has no moving parts, it rarely needs maintenance. Contrary to other types of cooling systems, the Peltier method is easily transportable. This is effect is used on refrigerators and air conditioners.

However, a Peltier element has a number of disadvantages besides inefficiency. It uses a lot of electricity and creates much more heat than it transports, which can easily lead to overheating if the extra heat isn’t compensated for. Condensation is another potential dangerous problem of using the Peltier effect, occurring if components are cooled too much.

The Tom Vales device runs by two dissimilar metals that go into cups of water. One cup is filled with hotwater and the other is filled with cold water. It transfers heat from one side of the device to the other side.

The Stirling Engine

The Stirling engine is a heat engine that is vastly different from the internal-combustion engine in your car. Invented by Robert Stirling in 1816, the Stirling engine has the potential to be much more efficient than a gasoline or diesel engine. But today, Stirling engines are used only in some very specialized applications, like in submarines or auxiliary power generators for yachts, where quiet operation is important. Although there hasn’t been a successful mass-market application for the Stirling engine, some very high-power inventors are working on it.

The Stirling Engine requires a temperature difference between two plates in order to run. In order to power the Stirling Engine,it has to be to one plate hotter than the other. This is easily achieved by placing the Stirling Engine on a cup of hot water.

The gap between the two plates is sealed, containing a fixed volume of air. As the bottom plate warms up, the air between the plates expands, pushing up the piston that seals a hole in the top plate. This piston is attached to the flywheel by a metal rod.

As the piston rises, the flywheel is turned. The movement of the flywheel in turn pushes down a second rod which is attached to a displacer sitting loosely between the plates. As the displacer moves downwards, it pushes air away from the hot bottom plate and up to the top plate, which is cooler. This causes the air to contract and the piston is pulled back down again, turning the flywheel further.

The turning flywheel raises the displacer again, pushing air back to the hot plate, and so the cycle continues while there is still a sufficient temperature difference between the two plates.

 

The Mendocino Motor

The Mendocino motor is a solar powered magnetically levitated motor this was the most impresive experiment that Tom showed us. The motor base consists of five sets of magnets. Four magnets in the base are levitation magnets which provides levitation force against the shaft magnets. The fifth magnet, is a field magnet which provides the magnetic field for the rotor.

The rotor consists of a shaft with a point on one end, magnets and rotor block. On the rotor block, there are four solar cells; one cell on each of the four sides and two sets of windings.

The rotor is levitated by the repelling force between the shaft magnets and the levitation magnets on the base. The levitation magnet also provides a forward thrust to keep the shaft point against the bearing plate. When the light strikes one of the solar cells, it generates an electric current thus energizing one of the rotor windings. This produce an electromagnetic field which interacts with the field magnets in the base, causing the rotor to turn. As the rotor rotates, the next solar cell comes in position, This cell now energizes the second winding. The process repeats again.