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Down wind faster than the wind

humber said:
There is nothing to see RossFW. This operation of this cart and Goodman's, are quite easy to explain. Both can certainly run close to the wind given enough time to accerarate. It is possible from that point to exceed the wind, at least for a short time.
However, many are so besotted with their own ideas, that they ignore the orthodox explanaiotns in favor of their own hyperbolic ideas.
The "understanding" that you are meant to adopt in order to overcome your initial sketicism, is acceptance of those ideas, while ignoring the more rational explanations.

Take a shortcut. If you can convince yourself, that the treadmill is representative of the cart when traveling at windspeed, rather than simply crawling up the belt as you see, then you are a suitable candidate for membership.
If you do understand equivalency, you will how its naively it is applied in that example, and why tou should doubt any further explanations based upon it.
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Humber, you have participated a lot on this thread, I'm assuming you have looked into it more than I have. Is it your opinion that they are lying when they say that professional physicists on other forums have accepted their tests as proof of their model? If you have a link, I would like to see the discussion, perhaps it has already been provided in this thread but I missed it.
 
RossFW, A simple way to find the truth is to simply solve the Newtonian physics for the cart. It's not that difficult and there are plenty here that are glad to help.
 
Marcus said:
Humber, you have participated a lot on this thread, I'm assuming you have looked into it more than I have. Is it your opinion that they are lying when they say that professional physicists on other forums have accepted their tests as proof of their model? If you have a link, I would like to see the discussion, perhaps it has already been provided in this thread but I missed it.
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Marcus, it was not me who made the assertion you state above, but I can provide you with a link to a discussion I was involved in on the physics forum. In this thread, the Mentor/Moderator eventually closed the thread because our critics wouldn't address his questions.

http://www.physicsforums.com/showthread.php?t=272437&highlight=resolved

He then opened another "closed" thread where he only took questions via PM and answered them in that thread. That thread is here:

http://www.physicsforums.com/showthread.php?t=274416

Hope that helps.

JB
 
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Here is the explanation that worked for my sister:

Imagine you are a balloon. You are neutrally buoyant in the air that surrounds you (you neither float up or down).

Are you blowing in the wind, or floating in still air? You don't know because you have no eyes or ears. To you, the air feels still, but you realize that you could be whizzing past treetops and not even know it.

So, you pray to the FSM, knowing full well that petitive prayer is useless, for some eyes to see if you are just floating still, or are being blown along for a ride. Lo and behold, he grants your wish and gives you eyes!

Now you look around with your new eyes and see the ground whizzing past at 50mph. You are indeed floating in the wind.

You also notice another balloon nearby. A beautiful balloon. The other balloon is also floating in the wind, and therefore staying the same distance from you. You decide that you'd like to get closer to the other balloon, and start to work out a way to get there.

The direction you want to go is the same direction that the ground is coming toward you from. This is very bad luck you think, because if you wanted to go the opposite direction it would be as easy as lowering an anchor to the ground, and being pulled in that direction.

You need to figure out a way to get yourself 'upground'. (Since the air is your domain, it doesn't appear to be moving. The ground is moving to you. So, calling it 'upground' is just like a human saying 'upwind'. The wind is the thing that is moving from the human's point of view.)

As you've already concluded, moving 'downground' would be easy. You simply drop an anchor. That gets you to thinking, though. "If I were anchored to the ground, all this still air around me would become a 50mph wind." You quickly realize you could use a windmill to extract some energy from all that wind. If you gear the windmill to a set of wheels at the bottom of your anchor, you could get your anchor to travel 'downground' faster than the ground is moving.

So, you've figured out that you can easily go away from your target balloon at 50mph by dropping an anchor. And you can get away from her at some speed faster than 50mph, by using a windmill and wheels on your anchor. But, you need to get closer to the beautiful balloon.

"Aha!", you'd say if FSM would grant you a mouth. Just reverse everything. Don't anchor yourself to the ground, anchor to the air (which is your current situation already). Don't use a windmill, use a 'groundmill' (a device that extracts energy from the ground that is whizzing by). Don't use wheels on your anchor, use a propeller (wheels grip the ground, while a propeller grips the air).

You end up building a cart similar to Spork's. Lowering it to the ground. Then, moving nearer to the object of your desire, and living happily ever after.
 
screensnot said:
Here is the explanation that worked for my sister...
Click to expand...

Several observations:

1) I like your description very much.
2) Your sister must be pretty sharp - because as accurate as your description is, I can name people with PhD's in physics and aerodynamics that wouldn't buy it.
3) Is she single?
4) Maybe your sister is smart (like most women). She didn't get it, but figured out how to make you stop talking. :D
 
Spork,

I have a feeling that #4 is the right answer, but she admitted that I was right, and I didn't want to push it. Just kidding, I believe she really got it.

She is married, sorry. I'll see what her husband thinks about DDWFTTW. Maybe she needs to trade up.
 
Don't know why it matters if there are nearby trees moving around while we're doing the test (I could just put trees on wagons next to a board track nailed to the ground in a breeze), and if you think that makes things different, go back to first semester physics.

Somebody said something about spork/JB's cart being limited to the "length" of the treadmill, but it has actually (on the treadmill) gone something like 450 feet averaging exactly wind speed (i.e. overcoming all rolling resistance and the drag involved with spinning the prop). Try to build something that light that can just keep a prop spinning through stored momentum -- fat chance.

My interest in this has a lot to do with investigating what kinds of explanations help different people understand how this works. Some are able to understand after seeing the demonstrations, others need other illustrations to help them see what's happening. So, after lurking here for quite a while, I decided to go ahead and write up my latest opus, The Parable of The Presence. Quite a fine work it is, and rather lengthy, but it explains the operation of the prop cart, starting from first principles, with no need for algebra, 3-D spatial reasoning, or fluid dynamics. Just as I got to the last paragraph, the ice storm that's raging outside my house killed the electricity for just long enough for me to lose it all. I will now drink myself into a stupor and try to regain the motivation to type it all again...
 
Marcus said:
Humber, you have participated a lot on this thread, I'm assuming you have looked into it more than I have. Is it your opinion that they are lying when they say that professional physicists on other forums have accepted their tests as proof of their model? If you have a link, I would like to see the discussion, perhaps it has already been provided in this thread but I missed it.
Click to expand...

I can't really say, Marcus. Lying is not a black and white matter. Sometimes an experts' opinions while not untrue, are taken out of context. There is also, the question of what the claimants believe to be true. One of science's greatest assets, is that it removes those influences.
I also see some skeptics making mistakes, so...
I can only tell you than no scientists or engineers of my acquaintance take it all seriously. I acknowledge that is an "appeal to authority".

Can a cart travel faster than winspeed? Possible I am sure. Orthodox science says that such a device cannot do so, if the only source of power is the wind, and that energy is consumed at that time. No storage is allowed, for example.
The wind does not have an absolute and constant speed, so "faster than" is indefinite term. That is a problem of measurement, of course.

A claim that would be contentious, and therefore of significance, would be a cart that could travel directly downwards in a constant airflow of known velocity, without using storage or other means. All the cart designs I have seen, appear to use momentum stored over a longer period than that of the actual period of above wind performance. This is not difficult to do.

I will replay to your earlier post within a few hours.
 
humber said:
... if the only source of power is the wind...
Click to expand...

That right there is the block that is holding you up, Humber.

Is it the wind that provides the power, or the ground, or both?

Is a sailboat powered by wind or water?

Until you can get the right answer for those two questions, you can't understand spork's cart.
 
humber said:
Can a cart travel faster than winspeed? ... Orthodox science says that such a device cannot do so, if the only source of power is the wind, and that energy is consumed at that time.
Click to expand...


In that case ice-boat racers must not know a damn thing about orthodox science because they achieve and maintain downwind velocity components of 3X the wind speed or better on a regular basis. We're not talking about treadmills and confusing physical principles here - just GPS receivers, wind meters, and ice-boats.

For the record, I'm an not responding in the hopes of changing humber's mind (or the minds of all those scientists with which he is acquainted), but rather for anyone that might not realize humber doesn't have even the most tenuous grasp on reality.
 
screensnot said:
Here is the explanation that worked for my sister:

Imagine you are a balloon. You are neutrally buoyant in the air that surrounds you (you neither float up or down).

Are you blowing in the wind, or floating in still air? You don't know because you have no eyes or ears. To you, the air feels still, but you realize that you could be whizzing past treetops and not even know it.

So, you pray to the FSM, knowing full well that petitive prayer is useless, for some eyes to see if you are just floating still, or are being blown along for a ride. Lo and behold, he grants your wish and gives you eyes!

Now you look around with your new eyes and see the ground whizzing past at 50mph. You are indeed floating in the wind.

You also notice another balloon nearby. A beautiful balloon. The other balloon is also floating in the wind, and therefore staying the same distance from you. You decide that you'd like to get closer to the other balloon, and start to work out a way to get there.

The direction you want to go is the same direction that the ground is coming toward you from. This is very bad luck you think, because if you wanted to go the opposite direction it would be as easy as lowering an anchor to the ground, and being pulled in that direction.

You need to figure out a way to get yourself 'upground'. (Since the air is your domain, it doesn't appear to be moving. The ground is moving to you. So, calling it 'upground' is just like a human saying 'upwind'. The wind is the thing that is moving from the human's point of view.)

As you've already concluded, moving 'downground' would be easy. You simply drop an anchor. That gets you to thinking, though. "If I were anchored to the ground, all this still air around me would become a 50mph wind." You quickly realize you could use a windmill to extract some energy from all that wind. If you gear the windmill to a set of wheels at the bottom of your anchor, you could get your anchor to travel 'downground' faster than the ground is moving.

So, you've figured out that you can easily go away from your target balloon at 50mph by dropping an anchor. And you can get away from her at some speed faster than 50mph, by using a windmill and wheels on your anchor. But, you need to get closer to the beautiful balloon.

"Aha!", you'd say if FSM would grant you a mouth. Just reverse everything. Don't anchor yourself to the ground, anchor to the air (which is your current situation already). Don't use a windmill, use a 'groundmill' (a device that extracts energy from the ground that is whizzing by). Don't use wheels on your anchor, use a propeller (wheels grip the ground, while a propeller grips the air).

You end up building a cart similar to Spork's. Lowering it to the ground. Then, moving nearer to the object of your desire, and living happily ever after.
Click to expand...

If the world were like that, then infinite velocity drive is just ahead.
The forces that drive a balloon cannot be simply stacked in series so they add. Why balloons? Try cars, and you see the problem immediately. Air is invisible, so you don't see how it drives things and can have powers as you wish when used figuratively, because nobody else can see the wind either, nor know much about it.

But those pesky professors and Phd's can, and don't buy it.
 
spork said:
In that case ice-boat racers must not know a damn thing about orthodox science because they achieve and maintain downwind velocity components of 3X the wind speed or better on a regular basis. We're not talking about treadmills and confusing physical principles here - just GPS receivers, wind meters, and ice-boats.

For the record, I'm an not responding in the hopes of changing humber's mind (or the minds of all those scientists with which he is acquainted), but rather for anyone that might not realize humber doesn't have even the most tenuous grasp on reality.
Click to expand...

We have been through this before. It is a naive assumption that the only thing that matters in windspeed craft is velocity. I can certainly design a vehicle that will exceed windspeed. You may not agree that it does so, according to your rules, which are always support your velocity argument at the exclusion of of all else.
If the amount of energy is not recorded, if the craft can change shape, store energy or be under intelligent control, then so what?
If you understood more, you would not be putting forward iceboats in support of your argument. You do not even understand your own designs.
 
humber said:
If the world were like that, then infinite velocity drive is just ahead.
The forces that drive a balloon cannot be simply stacked in series so they add. Why balloons? Try cars, and you see the problem immediately. Air is invisible, so you don't see how it drives things and can have powers as you wish when used figuratively, because nobody else can see the wind either, nor know much about it.

But those pesky professors and Phd's can, and don't buy it.
Click to expand...

What forces are 'stacked in series'?

Was there a force driving the balloon before it got its eyes?

Is the air moving, and the ground staying still? From the balloon's point of view?

If you can accept that the ground is the thing moving (from the balloon's POV), then can you see that it might be able to use some of the energy from the ground that is moving by, to do some work?

I picked balloons because it seemed to be the opposite of cars. It's been almost 50 pages of people trying to explain it to you with cars. You weren't getting it, so I tried to come at it from another angle.

I know that someday you will be convinced that the idea is sound. I truly believe this thing is going to get some real attention, maybe by Mythbusters. You will see a full size cart with someone driving it, on maybe the salt flats, and it will obviously outrun the wind. Even the most adamant denier will eventually eat crow. I hope the day you understand this thing, you won't be too embarrassed to come back to this forum and let us say I told you so. I promise not to be too hard on you.
 
Christian Klippel said:
Whenever i read or hear something like this, immediately i must think of Davis Gloff and his song "My poolboy has a PhD".

As if professors and PhD's are above humans and never get anything wrong.
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It's just more humberian nonsense. I asked two physics professors and they both understood immediately (although they agreed it was momentarily counter-intuitive).

From a physics point of view it's obvious this is possible. Whether this particular design works is a separate matter, but there's no law of physics that prevents it - and if something doesn't violate the laws of physics it probably can be built. Sailed vehicles routinely go faster than the wind - or at least they have since the time of square-sailed Viking ships. One can draw a force diagram for the cart in 30 seconds that shows how it works. Or notice that it's really easy to make something that goes into the wind - and so why not upground?

Etc. etc. etc.
 
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sol invictus said:
I asked two physics professors and they both understood immediately (although they agreed it was momentarily counter-intuitive).
Click to expand...

Hello Sol,

yes, that pretty much reflects my experience with people to whom i showed it. The first reaction was almost always "Uh, i don't think so", but after a second thought they all agreed that it was indeed possible.

I think something like this should be a required pre-test for everyone who wants to study physics or similar things. That surely would weed out a hell lot of people right from the start :)

Greetings,

Chris

P.S.: Needless to say that indeed they all agreed that the treadmill test is indeed perfectly valid to prove this cart.
 
humber said:
If you understood more, you would not be putting forward iceboats in support of your argument. You do not even understand your own designs.
Click to expand...

And this is exactly why I should never break my own rule and even acknowledge the posts of the mentally insane.
 
screensnot said:
I know that someday you will be convinced that the idea is sound. Even the most adamant denier will eventually eat crow. I hope the day you understand this thing, you won't be too embarrassed to come back to this forum and let us say I told you so.
Click to expand...

In the unbelievably unlikely event that humber was ever convinced of reality, I give you my absolute assurance that he'll explain how he knew it all along, and that we simply misunderstood him.
 
Christian Klippel said:
yes, that pretty much reflects my experience with people to whom i showed it. The first reaction was almost always "Uh, i don't think so", but after a second thought they all agreed that it was indeed possible....
P.S.: Needless to say that indeed they all agreed that the treadmill test is indeed perfectly valid to prove this cart.
Click to expand...

I wish I could say my experience was the same. I know of professors of Aero, Mechanical, and Physics, that absolutely don't believe it's possible (despite perfectly simple analysis and physical evidence) AND they don't understand how a treadmill can relate to "the real world".

It makes me cringe that these people are allowed to teach (or even work) in a technical field.
 
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