"Eisboch" wrote in message
...

"Short Wave Sportfishing" wrote in message
...
On Wed, 7 Nov 2007 16:41:36 -0500, "Eisboch"
wrote:


"Short Wave Sportfishing" wrote in message
...

Interesting video.

I wonder how it affects bow-to-stern movement? It is a gyro - seems
to me that if it has that much of an effect on side-to-side roll, it
would have the same effect on bow-to-stern movement..

The gyro vacuum enclosure appears to be mechanically restricted to fore
and
aft gimble movement, so I suspect it stabilizes on one axis only.

How the fore and aft movement translates to stabilizing beam to beam I
think
has something to do with the principles of gyroscopic progression,
similar
to helecopter controls of blade pitch.

But, I might be wrong.

I didn't think of that.

Good point.

Further on my boring analysis of this system ....

The manufacturer acknowledges that the system is similar to another
similar system, but claims it is superior due to the gryo being located
within a vacuum enclosure, thereby reducing the friction due to air. The
gyro can spin at a higher speed, therefore can be made smaller and uses
less power.

Fine.

But, having mucho years trying to make mechanical objects spin, move, etc.
in a vacuum environment, there is one potential issue that comes
immediately to mind.

In a vacuum there is no convective heat transfer to speak of, and very,
very little conductive heat transfer due to virtual point contact.
Bearings generate heat, particularly in high speed applications and if
that heat cannot be transfered away from the balls and races, the bearings
tend to self destruct. We used to use specially prepared aerospace
bearings designed for space flight in the systems we built ... and even
then often had problems with high speed applications.

It seems to me the big "breakthrough" in this product is the vacuum
enclosure of the high speed gyro. I'd be interested in how they handled
the issue I've described.

Eisboch
\

Maybe like diskdrives. No ball bearings. Fluid bearings.