Parallel Path Electric Motor

McC · Post by **McC** » 2006-02-22 10:17am

Could a recent development in electromagnetism spur a revolution in electric motor technology, providing true over unity with nothing more exotic than a pair of permanent magnets?

At Flynn Research, Parallel Path electromagnetism is explained as a method of controlling and directing magnetic flux within the core of a motor to provide an exponentially greater motive force than conventional motors. From their technical brief about the technology, Parallel Path could very well usher in a new age of powerful and highly-efficient electric motors.

The venerable electric motor operates on well-understood principles. A stator contains a coil that when energized with alternating current, generates a magnetic force which in turn acts on a rotor to produce motive force. Electric motors can turn the blades of a desk fan, the wheels of an electric or hybrid car, or the even the propeller of a massive cruise ship. Motors come in widely different sizes, though they share one characteristic--for each unit of electrical power consumed, contemporary motors generate a smaller unit of motive force. According to the laws of conservation, this makes sense. You should not be able to get more out of a system than you put into it and when someone claims to have invented something which does otherwise, skeptics are quick to challenge the validity of any claim that appears to violate conservation.

According to the technical brief at the Flynn Research website, Parallel Path is a quantum leap in electromagnetic motor technology that requires no exotic materials or questionable science. A Parallel Path motor uses a pair of permanent magnets in addition to the familiar stator-coil-rotor arrangement of current motors. The magnets, along with an air gap, allow all of the magnetic flux within the core to be manipulated and directed--this ability to manipulate the magnetic flux in the core of a motor is what provides the exponential increase in efficiency with Parallel Path technology. Best of all, the Parallel Path technology can be used with linear as well as rotary electric motors.

Independent replications of the Parallel Path technology appear to support Flynn Research’s claims. Testing and Finite Element Analysis show that the Parallel Path system indeed manages to not only increase the magnetic flux in the core by a factor of four over conventional electric motors, but manipulate the flux to act in the direction of motion, generating considerably more motive power than conventional motors.

While this is still a new technology, motors built with Parallel Path technology could provide a much-needed boost to the electric vehicle industry by providing motors that generate a lot of motive power while using considerable less electrical power.

What lends even more credibility to Parallel Path is that Boeing Phantom Works is apparently backing the technology and has recently presented with Flynn Research on the technology at the latest STAIF conference held Albuquerque, NM this Feb 2006

Interesting.

Admiral Valdemar · Post by **Admiral Valdemar** » 2006-02-22 10:38am

If this is what I think it is, it's ages old.

Molyneux · Post by **Molyneux** » 2006-02-22 12:20pm

Admiral Valdemar wrote:If this is what I think it is, it's ages old.

Well, what do you think it is?

drachefly · Post by **drachefly** » 2006-02-22 02:44pm

Total bullshit, that's what I think he thinks it is... and I agree with him.

The field equations conserve energy. You can't get over unity that way.

I won't even give this one a 'nice try'.

McC · Post by **McC** » 2006-02-22 02:50pm

drachefly wrote:Total bullshit, that's what I think he thinks it is... and I agree with him.

The Article wrote:Independent replications of the Parallel Path technology appear to support Flynn Research’s claims. Testing and Finite Element Analysis show that the Parallel Path system indeed manages to not only increase the magnetic flux in the core by a factor of four over conventional electric motors, but manipulate the flux to act in the direction of motion, generating considerably more motive power than conventional motors.

While this is still a new technology, motors built with Parallel Path technology could provide a much-needed boost to the electric vehicle industry by providing motors that generate a lot of motive power while using considerable less electrical power.

What lends even more credibility to Parallel Path is that Boeing Phantom Works is apparently backing the technology and has recently presented with Flynn Research on the technology at the latest STAIF conference held Albuquerque, NM this Feb 2006

It's not like they came out of no where and said, "Ta-da, look what we can do! Want to buy one?" Their method appears to have been replicated successfully, and is actually being presented in open forums. Here's their website if anyone wants to bring their bullshit detectors to bear.

drachefly · Post by **drachefly** » 2006-02-22 02:59pm

I read the highlighted sections. Be aware who is speaking here.

Okay, looking over the website, they speak of 'electrical input' as if that had technical meaning. Do they mean POWER? CURRENT?

Sure, their design uses half the current, but it has twice the impedance. Total power is the same.

drachefly · Post by **drachefly** » 2006-02-22 05:07pm

D'OH!

P = IV = IIZ -> half the current, four times the impedance.

That works with the design having to mess around with existing fields. Strengthening an existing field takes more effort than making the same amount of field in a field-free area.

Also note that the original website does not claim to beat unity. They do however use some very stilted language around the subject and...

Parallel Path Magnetic Technology will contribute to the age old physics debate as to whether a permanent magnet can provide additional energy to a magnetic system.

What debate? Magnets DEFINITELY add energy to a magnetic system, since they contain magnetic energy. They don't add power, though.

McC · Post by **McC** » 2006-02-22 05:25pm

drachefly wrote:Also note that the original website does not claim to beat unity. They do however use some very stilted language around the subject and...

Yeah, I chalked this up to bad reporting. I suspect that there was a mention of getting some kind of standard that was greater than what is normally deemed 100%, but not input/output energy expenditures. Whoever was functioning as journalist decided incorrectly to call this unity.

Braedley · Post by **Braedley** » 2006-02-22 05:45pm

Another example of a jurnalist who has no idea of what he/she is saying.

Stile · Post by **Stile** » 2006-02-22 06:09pm

This story is typical of many Flim-Flam artists that claim to come up with some revolutionary way of making immense amounts of energy/power from almost nothing. If these developments were so revolutionary, we would be all be living on free energy from suitcase sized generators in our basements.
Try reading some of the claims at James Randi Education Foundation; Dime a dozen...

Kuroneko · Post by **Kuroneko** » 2006-02-23 01:44am

The article is ludicrous, but the reason for the 'efficiency>1' implicature is unclear. It could be just plain wrong, but another possibility is that the motor demagnetizes the magnets during operation, thus making it possible four the output power to be greater than the electrical input power. But that's really no different from, say, a battery--characterizing that as a possible violation of conservation of energy is silly. Still, it would explain the journalist's error.

Yet another case of overblown physics reporting. We just had one only a little while ago...

drachefly · Post by **drachefly** » 2006-02-24 04:09pm

The thought occurred to me too, but I don't think permanent magnets contain all THAT much energy. Your demo would fail pretty quickly.