Where can I find a u-shaped soft iron to make Ed's PMH?

Forrest

I am ready to try some experiments that involve Ed's PMH and have had to luck trying to find it.

Magneticus_Attractus

@Forrest myself I just use Whirlpool dishwasher drain pumps. For $10 you get a mini PMH. Most of the soft iron is used in things like those.



I thought it was ironic how Edward had water features and the water pumps use the basic PMH to pump water.

I gave up looking for soft iron years ago when I figured out where it is all going.

poughkeepsieblue

I dont know much about metal working but from what i understand, iron can be annealed, removing slag, and making it softer, easier to work, and easily changes from a magnet, to a non magnet iron.

Ed mentions tempering magnets, but thats different, and im not sure if ed uses soft iron or tempered iron different. The way he alludes to them, i cant quite make any sense of it yet.
I just dont have the knowledge in it to make heads or tails.

But, i wouldnt put it past ed to do his own metallurgy, and if he was into wire, i wouldnt put it past him to make his own crucible, and perhaps his bbq pit was used to fire metals.

I know its not related to iron, but i believe ed was collecting silver dollars, and dimes, which were silver at the time, to amass enough silver to melt down for wire and other experiments.
He was clearly asking for dollars and dimes, and he had the bbq pit to melt them down. He also had wire producing tools in his toolshop. And silver is a good metal for electricity and uv collection, it just oxidixes to all hell.

So, my answer, is maybe if you need soft iron, you should make the hottest fire you can manage, and melt down some steel to get the slag out, and then youll have some soft iron.
If the people of the iron age could do it, why cant we do it? We live in the modern age... shouldnt we know how to produce the basic metals we take for granted everyday?

Where to get soft iron?

Learn how to make it
Then make it

Magneticus_Attractus

Soft iron doesn't have the memory of being magnetized. With hardened steel it will keep the magnetism.

I have a cold rolled steel rod that I put multiple magnet poles along the rod depending on where I place the coils. A magnetic compass shows the rod going N-S-N-S-N-S.

The mini PMH's are made from multiple sheets of soft iron, pretty much any transformer has soft iron.



This experiment helped me understand why the soft iron is stacked in layers. FYI the PMH is also called a C core and transformers use a E core. Both are made from soft iron not hardened steel.

Heyjoe

Forrest said:

I am ready to try some experiments that involve Ed's PMH and have had to luck trying to find it.

Iron filings are Soft Iron. Use a magnet, go collect some metal filings in the beach sand, melt it down and put it into a mold to make the U bar.

dracul4u

Go to a place that fabricates U-bolts. they should have a machine that can bend 1.5 inch steel. Use whatever steel they have on hand. make sure that the legs are perfectly straight and alligned, and when they cut them down to size, that they are flatly alligned - bring your own bar to test. it cost about $120 for me, the coils cost $350 to fabricate at a motor-winding shop

DuncanNorman

My virginal post on this forum so if I balls it up apologies . Soft pure iron isn't easy to come by as your learning especially if your hoping to build a full size original PMH .
I suggest if your near things maritime and particularly a breakers. old anchor chain links are a great source
Iron was used because of its resistance to rusting.
Incidentally I vaguely remember seeing PMH holder with a bowl of water on top showing Chladni figures does anyone have or remember that video ?

Kind regards Duncan

Magnetic_Universe

@DuncanNorman That's interesting because it emanates very little external magnetism when charged except at the barriers where the keeper bar and the U meet. Although Ed does have an experiment to prove that the two circulating currents in the PMH have the same structure as when running in the wire (double helical) in that the charged PMH should deflect two oppositely polarized needles in opposite directions when hung over the keeper. This is difficult to demonstrate with cold rolled steel rather than the now hard to find soft iron of Ed's day.

Magnetic_Universe

From Mineral, Vegetable and Animal Life: "If perpetual motion holder's North pole prong is put East. South pole prong West, and then elevate the cross-bar's center up to tile South pole vertically hanging magnet, then the magnet will swing South and when the cross-bar's center is elevated up to North pole vertically hanging magnet, then the magnet will swing North. The cross-bar's ability to swing the North and South pole magnets. off its center will remain as long as the cross-bar is not disturbed. It has little power but it could be made stronger by making bigger dimensions. From the above experiment you can see the perpetual motion holder can act as a living thing. It knows which way to swing each magnet. This shows if more magnets are added to a living then it can perform things it could not do before. The same is true concerning our body and everything else. Those surplus magnets, they are real life."

From Magnetic Current: "...The hanging magnets that hang up and down, they show that there is motion inside the bar. Hold the perpetual motion holder North Pole magnet or pole end East and South Pole magnet terminal or pole end West, now raise it up slowly to the South Pole hanging magnet, then you will see the South Pole hanging magnet swinging South. Now put the perpetual motion holder under the North Pole hanging magnet, raise up slowly, then you will see the North Pole hanging magnet swinging North. This experiment shows without any doubt that the North and South Pole individual magnets are running in the same direction as those in the copper wire, which came out of the car battery, and in both instances while the magnets are running ahead in whirling motion they used the right-hand twist."