Ever seen/built a Minto's wheel

[no one]

Has anyone out there ever seen or built a Minto wheel? I'm wondering if
there might be some way to make one work to charge batteries. But it looks
like a LOT of work for something that might not work.

 

[J. Clarke]

Has anyone out there ever seen or built a Minto wheel? I'm
wondering
if there might be some way to make one work to charge batteries.
But
it looks like a LOT of work for something that might not work.

There's a Yahoo group devoted to them. Don't know if anybody has
actually gotten one to produce useful power but it's worth a look
http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/MintoWheel/.

Conceptually it looks good. Practically I think that achieving an
adequate heat transfer rate is going to be the problem.