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posted by n1 on Thursday September 11 2014, @02:12AM   Printer-friendly
from the not-entirely-new dept.

A tabletop motor using an entirely new driving principle is under development at the headquarters of C-Motive Technologies, a start-up business that is commercializing technology from the College of Engineering at UW-Madison.

“We have proven the concept of a new motor that uses electric fields rather than magnetic fields to transform electricity into a rotary force,” says company co-founder Dan Ludois, an assistant professor of electrical and computer engineering at the UW. The distinction may sound minor, but it could solve a number of practical problems while saving money, he explains.

Actually, the concept is not entirely new: Benjamin Franklin and others described and built motors based on electrostatic forces back in the 18th and 19th centuries, but none achieved practical operation. Since the widespread adoption of electric motors a century ago, magnetism has been the only practical source of rotation. Magnetism is easier to exploit than electrostatic fields due to the properties of naturally occurring materials and simple engineering techniques. However, new advances in materials, mechanical engineering and advanced manufacturing may enable electrostatic motors.

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  • (Score: 4, Interesting) by evilviper on Thursday September 11 2014, @03:30AM

    by evilviper (1760) on Thursday September 11 2014, @03:30AM (#91921) Homepage Journal

    Simple electric motors are already 80-95% efficient. There isn't a lot of improvement to be made, no matter what technology you come up with.

    I'd like to see if it could be used to make frictionless bearings (in a vacuum), since eddy currents have undermined magnetic bearing developments. That could make flywheels a practical energy storage method, replacing large battery packs for EVs or grid-scale usage practically overnight.

    The new design avoids the use of precious “rare earth” metals and substitutes aluminum for the more expensive copper found in magnet windings of conventional motors and generators.

    Traditional motors could switch to aluminum wire just as easily. Rare earth materials (for the magnets) aren't required for generators, either. See dynamos:

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dynamo [wikipedia.org]

    It's true that motors can be large, so the claims that electrostatic motors could offer size benefits may have some truth, but it's just an assertion lacking specifics, so I'll wait until I see a prototype, and get some numbers on efficiency at those sizes. You can always shrink a motor, it's just that you lose efficiency as you do so.

    --
    Hydrogen cyanide is a delicious and necessary part of the human diet.
    • (Score: 2, Insightful) by blackpaw on Thursday September 11 2014, @03:55AM

      by blackpaw (2554) on Thursday September 11 2014, @03:55AM (#91925) Journal

      Simple electric motors are already 80-95% efficient. There isn't a lot of improvement to be made, no matter what technology you come up with.

      Maybe not in conversion of electricity to motion, but it sounds like it might be considerably easier and cheaper to build. And with fewer parts, maybe more robust.

    • (Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Thursday September 11 2014, @05:51PM

      by DeathMonkey (1380) on Thursday September 11 2014, @05:51PM (#92068) Journal

      Simple electric motors are already 80-95% efficient. There isn't a lot of improvement to be made, no matter what technology you come up with.
       
      A pretty significant advantage mentioned in the article seems promising:
       
        “Nothing is touching, because you are using electric fields to couple the stationary and rotating parts,” Ludois says. “There is no contact, and no maintenance.

        No maintenance is always good. Also, there could be some interesting applications taking advantage of the contact-less-ness.
       
      The article does say it is more efficient and lighter but no hard numbers to compare with.

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 11 2014, @03:56AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 11 2014, @03:56AM (#91926)

    This terrorist threat to profit must be eliminated! with extreme prejudice! FOR THE FREEDOMS

  • (Score: 4, Funny) by wonkey_monkey on Thursday September 11 2014, @07:18AM

    by wonkey_monkey (279) on Thursday September 11 2014, @07:18AM (#91954) Homepage

    A tabletop motor

    About time. I'm getting sick and tired of my motionless tabletop!

    --
    systemd is Roko's Basilisk
  • (Score: 2) by opinionated_science on Thursday September 11 2014, @01:51PM

    by opinionated_science (4031) on Thursday September 11 2014, @01:51PM (#92004)

    As pointed out in the PR blurb, this doesn't require magnetic materials...

    A thought comes to mind that this might be useful in hard drives, since a common point of failure is the motor.

    If I read this correctly, there is a fluid bearing, so perhaps those Helium drives would work better!!

    The magic sauce here I think is the same thing used for linear motors - a controlled waveform of electric field, interacting across a conducting plate.

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 12 2014, @02:56AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 12 2014, @02:56AM (#92228)

    This thing looks just like a Tesla invention I've seen before...Hmmm lemme think...

    Bah! I can't remember! ...must be new then.