Look Ma! - A Gas Turbine!

Thinking itself is not a natural process like eating, but an acquired skill like playing the piano: how well one will think will depend primarily on how much of it one has already done.
Northrop Frye, On Education, p. 27

The Oracle of Ottawa's "thinking about thinking" project still continues anon. At this point there are no doubt many dear readers who are wondering how it is all going. And the Oracle of Ottawa has thought the time right to give a very forceful demonstration of the "method" in action, with proof in actual footage. Proof how powerful logical left to right critical thinking can be, just a simple algorithm to a complex goal. This demonstration shows how all types of people can work at a set goal without having ever met. And the incredible unexpected results this simple process can yield.

Challenge - Make one of these at home...

The gas turbine evolved out of the development of the jet engine which was invented by Hans von Ohain and Frank Whittle, of course the German guy got to all the milestones first, contrary to what all of us were taught in school here in North America. As is usual the German guy got the patent and the first jet powered airplane into the air and the Englishman got all the glory. Frank Whittle ended up in the United States at the US Naval Academy as a prof, while Hans von Ohain was brought to America like a captured skilled slave under Operation Paperclip. How do you like the history of your (our) country so far?

Any way, a jet turbine is a simple and yet a rather complex device that essentially compresses, ignites and exhausts a flow of air for the purpose of generating thrust. Although invented by individuals, they were developed by the near unlimited resources of nation states. But while the Oracle of Ottawa was watching engine porn on You-Tube there seems to be a standing challenge to build the simplest gas turbine possible. Otherwise known as the pop can turbine. You would think that was all pretty foolish, but when you start to check it out, you will soon be blown away by the utter craft and cleverness of the home garage-ist tinkerer. The Oracle of Ottawa simply finds it all staggering in its implications and to what is really possible in our near futures. If these guys are doing this in their garage...

The first video that really impressed the Oracle of Ottawa doesn't reach full operation, or compression, whereby it would run on its own power, but it is very impressive in that it truly is made out of tin cans! Damn! The experimenter got it just to the edge, you can see that he got way over 10,000 rpm(!), and a fine focus of the fireball, it is just on the verge of shifting to the high whine of a real engine coming to life. The Oracle has watched this quite a few times and every time he simply astounded....

And you don't have to search very hard for the guy that actually pulled it off! The second video is again simply astounding. Not only did this agent get the engine to run fully, but he has it all instrumented! And the Oracle of Ottawa can only wonder what his neighbors thought of the guy next door running a rotating engine at a mere 67,000 r.p.m.!! in the driveway! But that is the power of the "thinking about thinking" method, and it just blows the Oracle of Ottawa totally away.

Now the Oracle of Ottawa did "shop" way back in high school, and he was awesome at the drafting and machine shop, but the idea that someone could fabricate a working gas turbine or even a very near working one was just thought to be totally impossible. But with You-Tube and one person showing everybody else how he or she did it, and the next guy that makes a brilliant and elegant breakthrough, the Oracle of Ottawa never gets tired of that. The power of "thinking about thinking"...