Really really cool balancing technique!

[am i dreaming?]

The other day i was messing around with the power ball and i got it up to about 10k and let it go and started rolling it around on my fingers.... it felt really weird like it was almost weightless.

after about 30mins i managed to balance it on the end of my little finger and it looked pretty cool.

i think it must have something to do with the gyro and the balance but give it a go and impress your family :-)

i know your never suppose to let go of it whilst its going but it hasnt done any damage to mine yet.

[Palm Pilot]

I think you are dreaming...make a short video and post it so we can see this one.

[am i dreaming?]

what, am i the only one who has tried this?

look get your powerball at a decent speed of about 10500 then let go and it does this kind of `lock` thing were it does'nt vibrate.

try balancing it about a bit its really weird i cant explain it i will make a video when i find the drivers for my webcam :-)

[Mchap77]

what, am i the only one who has tried this?

look get your powerball at a decent speed of about 10500 then let go and it does this kind of `lock` thing were it does'nt vibrate.

try balancing it about a bit its really weird i cant explain it i will make a video when i find the drivers for my webcam :-)
i can explain it with physics.... a gyro will balance when allowed to rotate freely because of "centripetal force". This is why a spinning top will stand up when spun at a high rpm, and why your powerball will balance if you let it spin freely. Hope this helps.

[BENNOTTS]

Yeah, the effect of a spinning disc is called the gyroscopic effect, it's sometimes reffered to as a phenomina because gyroscopes can behave in very strange ways. Basically as stated above, using spinning tops as an example, spinning discs want to stay spinning flat (or at whatever axis angle to get them spinning about!), so if you try to change the angle of the disc as it's rotating, it will resist this motion, this is what u feel from the powerball and this is how it gives you a work out. The heavier the disc, and the faster it's rotating, the more reaction force u'll feel.

Powerballs have manipulated this effect so that the user can 'fight' this reaction force which causes the disc itself to accelerate to try and match the force you're putting into it.

But anyway!! You will be able to balance the powerball (I reckon, tho haven't tried it yet!) on your finger, maybe even a pin head, if you get it spinning fast enough for it to produce enough of a restoring force to maintain balance.

Ben

[donkapone]

yes, a friend of mine told me about the test which he made at the university with a reaction engine which was based on the gyroscope... it weighted about 2 kilos but when started, it could be held on the tip of the finger...

[Palm Pilot]

I hear a lot of talk; I want to see a video. I've tried to "balance" it at all kinds of speeds and thank goodness I'm fast or it would be smashed on the floor. Quit dreaming about it and make a vid! :)

[BENNOTTS]

Although I stand by all I said about the gyroscopic effect, I take it back about being able to balance the powerball like I said... I've got my own powerball now and have found..... The balancing thing doesn't work.

The gyroscope inside them is loose (free to slide/roll on its axle along some internal groove) so trying to balance it is possible but very unstable, (so pretty much the same as trying to balance any other ball shaped object on your finger!)... If this groove (rail) were really worn or just made more restricted somehow, then yeah you'd get ur powerball to ballance like a spinning top, but I wouldn't expect to go breaking any records with your ball cause it'll be knackered ;)

The light up powerballs have more of this type of resistance on the axle... that would help make balancing it more stable...

[Scr3Am3r]

happened to me once in a really short time period:p

Really cool

[quackers_89]

Lads I think all he's talking about is when the rotor stops rotating. So for people with techno's, it has to happen all the time, why? We need to read the score.

I think thats it anyway

[armnerd]

Well , I know what "Am I dreaming" means, I managed to do do it several times today when i was on the bus. I got curious if it was possible to do it on purpose.
Guess what ? Its totally doable =) I will do a movie, as soon as I get a program in linux for my webcam. As of now I can only take snapshots. My explaination why this happens is that when you rev up the powerball, usually when you change the rotation direction of the ball. the gyro's axis switches tracks as if its a gear. I managed to get the powerball off gear and spin without the extra rotation and the gyro totally spinning. Anyways any slight motion makes the gyro to jump into "gear" and start rotating again.

Its cool stuff indeed =)

[armnerd]

Well , I know what "Am I dreaming" means, I managed to do do it several times today when i was on the bus. I got curious if it was possible to do it on purpose.
Guess what ? Its totally doable =) I will do a movie, as soon as I get a program in linux for my webcam. As of now I can only take snapshots. My explaination why this happens is that when you rev up the powerball, usually when you change the rotation direction of the ball. the gyro's axis switches tracks as if its a gear. I managed to get the powerball off gear and spin without the extra rotation and the gyro totally spinning. Anyways any slight motion makes the gyro to jump into "gear" and rotate again.

Its cool stuff indeed =)

Okay , now I have a movie on what I talked about. I have it on my blog.
http://chronicles-of-an-arm-nerd.blogspot.com/2006/04/nice-little-powerball-tric_114583826462200602.html
There you can see I have set the powerball showing the "realtime speed count" and there you can see that the ball don't have the torque and the gyro is perfectly spinning. As soon as I move too much the ball jerks away and the normal torque is there.