Magnetic Refrigeration no electricity needed

[SeaKing]

Here is an article about a new technology that would be great for cruisers.

Magnetic refrigerator needs no electricity - Denmark - Official website of Denmark

[CSY Man]

Cool, lets hope it work in real life too.

(Cold beer in the Bahamas, no juice needed, excellent concept)

[David M]

There is not enough detail in the article. If electricity does not power it then what does? I don't want to come across as a pessimist but nobody has found a way to circumvent the laws of thermodynamics including the first law, the conservation of energy. There is no perpetual motion machine that works. Magnets themselves do not create energy. This may be a new way of cooling but it still has to be powered by something. I'm not going to hold my breath on this invention.

[delmarrey]

It still needs pumps to run the liquids.

[markpj23]

Originally Posted by delmarrey

It still needs pumps to run the liquids.

Well... probably not. Current RV units that heat via propane or 12v heaters rely upon straight convection to move the refrigerant around - no pumps.

This could be really cool... pun intended

[Fishspearit]

The article says the first prototype won't be ready until 2010, that puts it solidly in the realm of theory and imagination.
And David M, I could almost argue with your statement "Magnets themselves do not create energy." Since all you need is a magnet, a conductor, and relative motion between the two and you will induce a voltage into that conductor; it could be argued that magnets do create energy, albeit not by themselves.

[Alan Wheeler]

No the magnet does not "create" energy. The enrgy comes from the motion of the conductor. That is why it takes energy to spin the armature through the magnetic field.
The same would apply to the coolant in the fridge. Some force would have to move the coolant through the field, (if that is how it works). You can not make something from nothing. So whatever it is that is producing the heat, also must be requiring energy to produce the heat. If this does not happen, then as the heated liquid is cooled, then it would not absorb heat to replace the heat energy removed. It is the basic law that describes the working of a cooling device.

[David M]

Originally Posted by Fishspearit

The article says the first prototype won't be ready until 2010, that puts it solidly in the realm of theory and imagination.
And David M, I could almost argue with your statement "Magnets themselves do not create energy." Since all you need is a magnet, a conductor, and relative motion between the two and you will induce a voltage into that conductor; it could be argued that magnets do create energy, albeit not by themselves.

Magnets can be used to transfer energy or store energy as potential energy converted to kinetic energy, but magnets themselves do not create energy. The energy necessary to cool will have to come from something else other than the magnets.

[Fishspearit]

Originally Posted by Alan Wheeler

No the magnet does not "create" energy. The enrgy comes from the motion of the conductor. That is why it takes energy to spin the armature through the magnetic field.
You can not make something from nothing.

Well, just to exercise the brain I will argue with these points. 100 years ago it was an immutable law of physics that mass can be neither created nor destroyed, but we proved that wrong. Mass can be converted to energy which is the basis of harnessing energy from nuclear fission. So perhaps someday we can show that energy is not necessarily a zero sum equation just as the conversion of mass is not. A magnet is in a sense 'stored energy', and while we now use ineffecient engines to create the relative motion in a generator, we may find a more efficient form of motion in the future which consumes less than the electrical output from the magnet. Since we live on a giant spinning ball, maybe we'll be able to figure out how to use that motion someday. Maybe a giant magnet on the moon and a giant copper girdle around the equator to power the planet?

[LtBrett]

Originally Posted by Fishspearit

So perhaps someday we can show that energy is not necessarily a zero sum equation just as the conversion of mass is not. ... Since we live on a giant spinning ball, maybe we'll be able to figure out how to use that motion someday. Maybe a giant magnet on the moon and a giant copper girdle around the equator to power the planet?

The conversion of mass is a zero sum game. E=MC^2

The difference in thinking is that now we realize that the lost mass is converted to energy. You can also convert energy directly into matter. Still a closed system.

Your other idea about generating power from something in orbit is not too far off. It has been tried:
The Space Tether Experiment

The problem is nothing is free. Put a conductor out to make power while in orbit, you slow down. But it will theoretically work in reverse, as well. Put power into a conductor in orbit, you speed up. Sounds like a primitive start to a much better propulsion system (no moving parts).

At any rate, this fridge sounds like a pipe dream. You can move fluid around using natural circulation, which depends primarily on a temperature gradient. But the idea that you can use magnets to get a temperature gradient, then "thermodynamically reverse" it without adding electricity is laughable. I suspect there is some merit in the experiment that was conducted, and simple poor reporting made for an overly-simplistic (thus incorrect) explanation.

Brett

[Viking Sailor]

The clue to the operation of this device is in the statement - "cooling cycle efficiency will be 60 percent greater than that of conventional refrigerators". The question you need to ask is what is the total thermodynamics of this system. If the magnets are heating the working fluid, are the magnets cooling? Are the magnets then being heated by the environment? This is not perpetual motion. It is the transfer and conversion of heat energy through a system.

[Alan Wheeler]

A magnet is in a sense 'stored energy'

No sorry it is not.
You can prove this. if it were the case of "stored energy", putting two magents together would either create more energy, or they would use up the energy, depending on what way you oreintate them. Seeing as a magnet does not lose magnitism(as long as it is not demagnitised) then if it was energy, it could be said that a magnet was a perfect conductor and Non-conductor at room temperature. Which we know is not true. The only super conductors we know of are such only at minus 200+ deg.

[jim lee]

As I read it they are taking the propane heating element out and repacing it with a microwave unit. Is your microwave oven better than a propane flame? Donno'..

-jim lee

[Alan Wheeler]

Maybe a giant magnet on the moon and a giant copper girdle around the equator to power the planet?

Yeah I know your joking. But just to be annoying I guess, two main flaws in your future dream there fish. One is the Moon does not orbit the earth at a contant distance. It varies. Plus the Moon is moving away from the Earth at approx. 1.5" a year.
So if you thought the Moon looked bigger when you were a Kid, it's because it was several feet closer :-) And yes, it means the tide range is just a little fraction less each year.

[Lancerbye]

Alright haven't any of you read Dick Tracy Comic books as a kid. Their propulsion system were magnetic. Maybe like sailing through magnetic fields. Besides energy can neither be created or destroyed, only converted from one form to another. Someday maybe we will have such cool propulsion systems as magnetic if we can get around the concept of thinking outside the oil box. We can dream.