WHAT IS IT USED FOR?                            (c)1997 William J. Beaty

http://amasci.com/emotor/emotor.html

What's this Pop Bottle motor good for?  Well, it's mostly useful as a
physics demonstration, to show that "static electricity" isn't feeble and
useless.  If you have an electrostatic generator, this motor gives you
another use for it.

It is a little-known fact that there is a tiny charge flowing between the
sky and the surface of the earth.  This sort of motor has been run
directly from the sky-current.  A tall antenna is insulated from the earth
and is used to intercept the vertical current and develop a high voltage
to drive the motor.  This charge flow is pumped by thunderstorms all over
the world, so you might say that electrostatic motors can directly harness
the power of thunderstorms.  One researcher (Dr. Oleg Jefimenko) attained
1/16 horsepower output using a "Poggendorf" electrostatic motor, a type
which uses a plastic cylinder surrounded by knife-edge electrodes.  He
runs his e-motors with a fine wire lifted by a weather balloon.

Compared to normal motors, electrostatic motors are extremely light in
weight and use inexpensive materials.  A normal motor requires iron cores
and heavy copper wire, while an electrostatic motor can use thin
lightweight plastic and incredibly thin metal coatings.  This should be
very useful when people start living fulltime in space.  Lifting a heavy
iron motor into orbit is costly in terms of fuel and spacecraft
maintenance, it is far cheaper to lift a thin plastic motor.

Electrostatic motors are much weaker than iron/copper motors because they
cannot be used with *really* high voltage.  An iron/copper motor is based
upon electric current, and it can be used with high current in order to
get high power output.  It gets hot, but thicker wire and cooling fans
take care of that.  Electrostatic motors are different, they are based on
voltage, and if you turn the voltage up on an electrostatic motor, you
don't get increased motor power, you just get big sparks.  The air between
the metal plates turns conductive, and the sparks short out the power
supply.  However, if you place this sort of motor in a vacuum, normal
sparks become impossible.  (Sparks are air which has turned into plasma,
and without air, there is no plasma and no sparks.)  You then can turn the
voltage up hundreds or thousands of times higher, which gives you much
MUCH higher power output. Where's a source of inexpensive vacuum?  Space,
obviously!  Zero-cost vacuum, and the high cost of lifting heavy materials
into orbit, make electrostatic motors a good choice for applications in
space.

You may have heard about the recent invention of "Micromotors",
microscopic motors built of silicon and constructed on the surface of
integrated circuit chips.  Most of these motors are electrostatic motors,
because it's easy to lay down a two-dimensional electrode pattern on
silicon, while it's nearly impossible to wind a 3D coil magnet.  Your
basic silicon micromotor contains a whirling conductive paddle which is
surrounded by metal electrode plates.  The plates are electrified in
sequence by an external power supply circuit, and the paddle follows the
moving voltage wave.  Where your large pop-bottle motor uses 10,000 volts,
the micromotors typically use 100v or less.

Your body is run by muscles which can lengthen and contract.  Muscles are
a class of motor called a "linear motor" (the opposite of a "rotary"
motor.)  Muscles move when long molecules are slid across each other by
sequential chemical bonding, and this chemical bonding is (guess!)
electrostatic.  Your muscles are electrostatic motors.  Your body is a
robot which runs entirely with linear electrostatic stepper motors.

Ever hear of Nanotechnology?  This is the study of objects and patterns
which are the size of atoms.  One goal of nanotechnology is to build
machines which are the size of molecules, and these machines will require
rotary motors and linear motors.  These motors will be electrostatic. 
Actually, these motors already exist.  Certain bacteria are able to swim
because they have wiggling cilia as "propellers."  A few years ago it was
discovered that some bacteria cilia does not wiggle, instead it spins.
Among these is the E. Coli bacteria in your intestines.  The spinning
cilia is powered by a molecule-sized rotary electrostatic motor!  If
nature can build these motors, then Nanotechnology will eventually do the
same (or maybe instead we will learn to harness the bacteria genetics, and
GROW our molecular electrostatic motors as desired.)

In light of all of the above, don't you begin to get the idea that
electrostatic motors are normal and sensible, while coil/magnet motors are
the odd and strange ones? 



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William J. Beaty                                  SCIENCE HOBBYIST website
billbeskimo.com                                  amasci.com
EE/programmer/sci-exhibits          science projects, tesla, weird science
Seattle, WA   206-762-3818          freenrg-L taoshum-L vortex-L webhead-L