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$5000 CONTEST! and follow up investment! ***CANCELLED***

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LAN_403

Mon Feb 12 2007, 05:50PM

Banned on April 7, 2007
Registered Member #277 Joined: Fri Mar 03 2006, 10:15AM
Location: Florida
Posts: 157

I like Steve's idea of a contest, but in my opinion, a contest needs to be arranged to result in something more useful than just lighting an LED, so here's a 2nd contest. US$5000 (five-thousand dollars) payment to the winner will be made by either Paypal, or by bank wire, winner's choice. The judges will be Steve, Alex and Bjorn (unanimous vote required to select a winner). If one or more begs out of being a judge, substitutions can be made. A consensus of the 4org membership supersedes the judges decision in the event of a winner dispute.

CONTEST RULES:

Seeking one alternative power source that meets the following four (4) criteria:

1) The alternative power source must have a minimum 95% duty cycle. Meaning out of each and every 24 hour period, it generates power for at least 22.8 hours of each period as measured over six months. Key word "generates", does not include use of stored energy in batteries or other mediums, gases, etc.

2) The alternative power source must be geographically comprehensive. Meaning it can be utilized consistently everywhere on the planet, including all continents, the poles and over the sea, during all seasons. This ensures it could benefit all humanity.

3) The alternative power source uses no man-made (obviously no human or animal power) man-altered or non-renewable consumables as fuel. An example of a man-altered consumable being an earth or sea battery which requires periodic replacement of metal/minerals, or antennas that rectify or otherwise make use of manmade RF/other manmade signals (example: Tate Module).

4) The alternative power source can demonstratably be used to drive a fuel cell producing hydrogen (during any 24 hour period) in quantities capable of powering an electric motor/wench to lift a ten pound (10 Lb) weight five (5) feet off the ground.

The exception to this contest being ionic or atmospheric energy harvesting devices, since that is already subject to patent pending. The winner of this contest retains all ownership rights to his/her invention or development. The US$5000 reward does not constitute purchase of the idea in part of whole. In the event of clarification, interpretation or dispute of the written critera, the judges will deem the interpretation of this contest's financier (me) as final clarification.

The contest starts today (Feb 12th 2007) and concludes in twelve (12) months after which time payment will be issued to the winner. In the event of multiple winners, the amount will be equally shared. This post constitutes a legally binding agreement between myself and the winner(s) for payment to be made. I'll not only gladly pay the US$5000, but after successful phone talks, I'll fly the winner(s) to sunny Florida to discuss my becoming the prime financial investor in your invention.

Dr. Shark

Mon Feb 12 2007, 06:07PM

Registered Member #75 Joined: Thu Feb 09 2006, 09:30AM
Location: Montana, USA
Posts: 711

There should be more geek-friendly venture capitalists like you around, CM. 500$ might just cover the beer expenses developing something like this

, I'm in!

Just to clarify the rules regarding geographic locations: Are classical renewable energies like wind and solar power out, because you could always find a little spot on the planet that is dark all year round or has zero wind? I fear this would disqualify 99% of all entries, since even ionic energy from the atmosphere ultimately depends on solar irradiation and air movement.

Mon Feb 12 2007, 06:13PM

Banned on April 7, 2007
Registered Member #277 Joined: Fri Mar 03 2006, 10:15AM
Location: Florida
Posts: 157

Joe:

Good point, I bumped it to US$5000. Solar or wind are acceptable entries if the 4 criterias are met. CM

Eric

Mon Feb 12 2007, 07:58PM

Registered Member #69 Joined: Thu Feb 09 2006, 07:42AM
Location:
Posts: 116

Do you need to convert the energy to hydrogen and then convert it to physical work or can you just do the work directly?

Are storage devices (ultracapacitors/batteries) allowed to accumulate the generated power? I'm not clear from the above description whether they are allowed or not.

Oh, and one other thing. Does this device actually have to be built or is the design/idea enough.

Nik

Mon Feb 12 2007, 10:25PM

Registered Member #53 Joined: Thu Feb 09 2006, 04:31AM
Location: Ontario, Canada
Posts: 638

I submit my little brother. He is, with some coaxing, probably able to stay awake for 22.8 hrs a day.

He can be used anywhere.

He can be fuled with fully renewable consumeables.

And he can easily lift a 10lb weight 5 feet off the ground (and if needed he can drive a conventional generator to power a fule cell).

...

Mon Feb 12 2007, 10:48PM

Registered Member #56 Joined: Thu Feb 09 2006, 05:02AM
Location: Southern Califorina, USA
Posts: 2445

i would say that the 'produces enough h2 to lift a 10lb weight 5ft using a motor/witch' is sorta of vague, since not all fuel cells/motors are considered equal...

Lets see, 5lbs= 4.536kg, 5ft=1.524m, and gravity is 9.6m/s, so that is 66.3J of kenetic energy. Lets assume that our motor is 50% eficient, and then the fuel cell is 65% (I don't really know) we need 200J of H2. So, since the deltaT for H2+.5O2->H2O is -286kj we would need 0.015L of H2.

What do you just say that over a 24hr period it needs to produce 15ml amount of H2 gas?

Also, is there some way to send a preliminary plans so that we can comfirm that we are not breaking any rules, and that our idea hasn't been taken?

Finally, is there any size limit?

Steve Conner

Mon Feb 12 2007, 11:02PM

Registered Member #30 Joined: Fri Feb 03 2006, 10:52AM
Location: Glasgow, Scotland
Posts: 6706

+1 on Nik's little brother. We could also have Tesladownunder pedalling a generator, since he has completed a 24 hour bike ride in the past (IIRC)

However, if you read the fine print, the device has to produce power for 22.5 hours per day for 6 months, so unless you actually want to kill your little brother from exhaustion, it's not too practical. A team of 20 people pedalling for 2 hours a day each might work

Read finer still though, and the spec is very vague on power output, so to make it as easy as possible, I would take it to mean that the device must produce enough power to lift one 10lb weight 5ft each day. That is only 75J (or 66 even?) of energy per 24 hours. One joule is one watt-second.

So, a bike generator is massive overkill. I could crank the hand generator from one of those freeplay radios for a minute each morning to charge one of those 1 farad audio booster caps, and have a power source that meets CM's criteria to the letter. Note that supercapacitors are not "batteries, mediums or gases".

This would work anywhere a human can turn a handle, and I can run off renewable materials such as water, granola and dolphin friendly tuna, so I claim the $5k prize. If you need to see a demonstration, I can build it for about 40 bucks. Heck, I could save 40 bucks and lift the 10lb weight 5ft every day myself. Now I come to think of it, I could hang a 10lb weight on a 5ft string hooked up to a falling weight generator like stop4stuff's, and wind it up every morning...

...

Mon Feb 12 2007, 11:23PM

Registered Member #56 Joined: Thu Feb 09 2006, 05:02AM
Location: Southern Califorina, USA
Posts: 2445

Well, he does say that is has to produce energy for 95% of the time, so you still have to be awake all of the time.

But I would say that a tank of like 10 hamsters and a few running weels would do the job just fine. Just add a few coffee beans into the food dish :p

Eric

Mon Feb 12 2007, 11:58PM

Registered Member #69 Joined: Thu Feb 09 2006, 07:42AM
Location:
Posts: 116

How about a quarter square kilometer antenna capturing the 3 degree blackbody radiation. That's about a watt continuous, anytime, anywhere. Assume a conversion efficiency of 160GHz radiation to 'useable' power of 1% and you've got joules to spare.

Gosh, I hope nobody steals my idea.

AndrewM

Tue Feb 13 2007, 03:24AM

Registered Member #49 Joined: Thu Feb 09 2006, 04:05AM
Location: Bigass Pile of Penguins
Posts: 362

Regarding rule #2, and #3, since we're not creating matter from energy, this machine HAS to consume some raw material (like water, for example)... and yet, liquid water is not practical or easy to come by at the south pole. please clairfy.

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