Perpetual Motion.

Waipukurau Press, Issue 22, 27 February 1906, Page 2

Perpetual Motion.

Three Centuries of Misdirected Ingenuity. The secret of perpetual motion has for centuries kept in perpetual commotion a certain type of individual who has never tired of trying to discover it. Up to last month no success has to be recorded. The records of the British Patent Office show that as recent as the years 1901, 1902, and 1903 there were, respectively, 13, 10. and 9 applications for patents relating to perpetual motion. From the year 1617, the date of the earliest patent, to the present time, the subject has received a fair' share of attention, the number of applications for patents between 1617 and 1903 being over 600, of which only 25 have a date prior to 1855. In the many projects and schemes for obtaining perpetual motion use is made chiefly of the force of gravity, loss of equilibrium, and the specific gravity of Boats and weights immersed in waler or other liquid. What is almost pathetic is that so many inventors provide brakes with which to stop their machines when; necessary. The earliest patent granted for a. perpetual motion device is dated March 9, 1635, and refers to “ skill of makeing engins which, being put in order, will cause and maiuteynetheir own mocions with continuance and without any borrowed force of man, horse,, river or brooke.” Compressed air, says a writer im Cassier’s Magazine, has been re« sorted to in various ways as a means of solving the problem. But what appears to be the simplest device is a pump which drives awaterwheel by discharging water upon it, the wheel, in turn, being, supposed to drive