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I am very fond of magnetic toys and I have quite a number of them in my collection.
Only very occasionally, in fact only twice I think, I have come across magnetic toys
which have a completely new principle, and this is the second one I have come across.
Extraordinary. And it consists of just four neodymium discs
which are very strong magnets, and then here we have a ring containing six very small neodymium
magnets. And now to make the effect we simply have
to join these pieces together, thus. That is quite strong now. And this one here, that
is a strong one. To show how strong they are, we will just
bring them together and see what happens. It is going to push it away from quite a distance.
Anyway we want it to be attracting, so I am going to put it in that mode there, where
it is going to come towards it. I will keep it away.
Now the ring here, we are going to get this into repulsion mode, to try and get it to
push away. Oh, it is attracting. So I will turn it over,
and now it should repel. Yes, it is repelling.
Now the clever part is when we put these two pieces together as an assembly;
we have now got a single magnetic system in which we have one that is going to be attracted
to this, and the little set of six which are being repelled by this outside magnet.
What is going to happen? When I bring it towards it, it is being attracted
by the middle one but it is being repelled by the little satellite ones on the outside.
What could happen? Oh. It was attracted and it stopped; it is
being repelled. There is about an eighth or quarter inch air
gap there, where it cannot get any closer, but not further away either.
That is absolutely amazing. If I turn this one, well nothing much there.
If I turn the big one though, the ring, let us see what happens.
It turns round with it. Still maintaining that air gap of about an eighth to quarter
inch. All the way round.
It refuses to get any closer and yet it will not go any further away either. It is a kind
of equilibrium - it is stuck there, like an invisible arm joining the two together.
It is called an Inverter by the inventor, and it reminds him I suppose of the tractor
beam in Star Trek. Invisible. But anyway to me it is magic. It is a physics
I do not understand, but it is wonderful.