Ferguson's Device
James Ferguson was an eminent Scotch mechanician and astronomer. He was born in 1710, and died in 1776. He was reared in very humble circumstances, and is known as the Peasant Boy Philosopher. A most interesting story of his life was written by Henry Mayhew, and published in England in 1857, entitled "The Story of the Peasant Boy Philosopher."
He prepared astronomical tables of great value and lectured on astronomical and mechanical subjects. His lectures were edited by a no less eminent man than Sir David Brewster.
While Perpetual Motion seemed to have received considerable time and attention from him, and while his writings show that he examined a great many mechanical devices, he seems all the time to have entertained serious doubt of the possibility of a machine having self-motive power. However, in 1770, he devised a machine for the purpose of producing Perpetual Motion. It does not appear that he ever offered the machine to the public, or sought publicity for it. A description of it is to be found in his Common Place Book in the University Library, Edinburg. The description there furnished is as follows:
The axle at A is placed horizontally, and the spokes B, C, D, etc., turn in a vertical position. They are jointed at s, t, u, etc., as a common sector is, and to each of them is fixed a frame as R, S, T, etc., in which the weights 7, 8, 9, 1, 2, etc., have liberty to move. When any spoke as D is in a horizontal position, the weight I in it falls down and pulls the part b of the then vertical spoke B straight out, by means of a cord going over the pulleys K and k to the weight I. The spoke C c was pulled straight out before, when it was vertical, by means of the weight 2, belonging to the spoke E e which is in the horizontal position D d; and so of all the others on the right hand. But when these spokes come about to the left hand, their weights 4, 5, 6 fall back, and cease pulling the parts f, g, h, i; so that the spokes then bend at their joints X, y, z, and the balls at their ends come nearer the center A, all on the left side. Now, as the balls or weights at the right hand side are farther from the center A than they are on the left, it might be supposed that this machine would turn round perpetually. I have shown it to many who have declared it would; and yet for all that, whoever makes it, will find it to be only a mere balance. I leave them to find out the reason.