I was following a thread on a popular boating forum about using solar powered garden lights as anchor lights. It all got very silly with suggestions that one solar powered light could energise an adjacent solar powered light – a sort of perpetual motion of lights.
Eureka!
Here we see my solar powered perpetual motion outboard motor. The solar lamps are powered by their own light output being reflected back on their solar panels via the mirror.
The heat generated by the lights causes the air above the lamps to rise; this draught of air turns the turbine which, via the gearbox, turns the propeller. Simple!
And you wouldn’t need an all round white navigation light at the stern.
Clearly there are some engineering details to work out but I’m a concept man – others can figure out how much light output would be needed to move specific boats at specific speeds, how to start and stop it, and so on.
I’ve shown it bolted to the back of Dylan Winter’s famous vessel, the slug, for it was he who suggested the principal of perpetual motion by garden light. We’ll be applying for an EU grant to build a prototype – wish us luck!
