Strongest Magnets Available?
- Thread starter Mcfly
- Start date
Cmdr.Kerner
Master Member
Hello, I'm starting a new project with my die cast deloreon, and I'm going to build a small street which i want the deloreon to hover on, what would be the best magnets for a job like that??
Thanks
Kind regards Jason.
Hi Jason,
the stongest magnets I know are called rare earth or neodyme magnets. Since a few years I'm building my Starfleet rank pips out of them. You get them in various shapes, sizes and colors.
Here's the link from my magnet dealer: Magnete fr jeden Bedarf - magnet-shop.net
Dietrich
Mcfly
Active Member
Mcfly
Active Member
Do you think they'll have any strong enough to hold an 800g Deloreon?
Thanks you.
Take care Jason.
I'd throw out a word of caution. Earth magnets can and will reak havok on credit cards, audio and video tapes, even cameras in some circumstances. You will want to keep a tight leash on the display and what goes near it.
Lutso
Sr Member
I can vouch for that. My friend has a big (six inch) rare earth magnet which had to be taken off a refrigerator with a prybar. He now keeps it in a double-insulated box on the floor, in the corner, facing the wall, in his closet.
It'll tear through all sorts of electronics, and it will definitely smash your fingers to oblivion if you get them caught between it and a metal surface.
It'll tear through all sorts of electronics, and it will definitely smash your fingers to oblivion if you get them caught between it and a metal surface.
My advice comes out of pain. I lost two hours of filming on DVR tapes that I put too close to one of those suckers...and i am talking the half an inch kind.
TazMan2000
Master Member
Rare earth magnets can also be found in computer hard drives. Take an old one (non-functioning preferably) apart. Those suckers are powerful.
Tazman2000
Tazman2000
Mcfly
Active Member
Mcfly
Active Member
I'll give that a try mate, got an old hard drive kicking about here somewhere
Take care Jason.
I would ask how you intend to make it hover... Simply placing like poles in the street and on the bottom of the car is unlikely to give you the result you want. More likely is that the car will simply flip over and smash into the roadway.
Barring the road being made of superconductor (which a magnet will naturally hover over) or something physical to keep the car in place above the roadway, I'm not sure how you would make this work.
Barring the road being made of superconductor (which a magnet will naturally hover over) or something physical to keep the car in place above the roadway, I'm not sure how you would make this work.
TazMan2000
Master Member
It would indeed be a difficult task, but I'm sure there are several ways to get it done...it would take a lot of experimentation of course.
You could put several magnets with the north poles facing up in a circular pattern and angled upwards at the outer edges (much like a bowl). Then glue the other magnets with the north poles facing down. If properly positioned the object "should" center in the middle of the 'donut shaped' magnetic flux field. However, depending on the strength of the magnets, you might not get the desired effect with a scale car, without it looking like you glued a whole bunch of magnets to it.
A simpler solution would be to hide a spring-steel rod, somewhere in your diorama.
TazMan2000
Hugh Jorgens
New Member
Here are some dirt cheap magnets. They take a few weeks to arrive, but its a small price to pay. As mentioned, be careful, these things will tear themselves apart to stick to each other.
$3.30 - Super Strong Rare-Earth RE Magnets (20-Pack 12mm x 1mm) - Rare Earth/RE Magnets
$3.30 - Super Strong Rare-Earth RE Magnets (20-Pack 12mm x 1mm) - Rare Earth/RE Magnets
Gigatron
Sr Member
I'm going to save you a lot of heartache and wasted time - it won't work.
Devices that have hovering items, like desktop novelties or globes, have bases which include ICs and cotrollers in them. The magnets are rapidly switched on and off, thousands of time per second, to maintain a "stabilized" magnetic field - which is easily disturbed. Plus, the items that are hovering are usually in the 30gram range - nowhere near the 800g, you want to use.
And opposing fields are even more difficult to control than attracting fields, even with cheats.
Now that's not to say that what you want to do, can't be achieved - you just have to know how to fake it, with what you've got to work with.
Ok, so you want to do a street diorama. Add a streetlight to the diorama - this will solve most of your problems. Add a magnet to the light portion of the pole. In the car, under the roof, add a second magnet with the attracting pole facing up. The is will create a pull between the two magnets.
secure the car to the base with a length of invisible thread or 1lb fishing line, in the middle of the bottom of the car. It'll be almost impossible to see and you don't have to worry about the car flying off. You'll achieve your illusion and it will be infinitely easier and cheaper than experimenting, only to come to the same conclusion.
-Fred
Devices that have hovering items, like desktop novelties or globes, have bases which include ICs and cotrollers in them. The magnets are rapidly switched on and off, thousands of time per second, to maintain a "stabilized" magnetic field - which is easily disturbed. Plus, the items that are hovering are usually in the 30gram range - nowhere near the 800g, you want to use.
And opposing fields are even more difficult to control than attracting fields, even with cheats.
Now that's not to say that what you want to do, can't be achieved - you just have to know how to fake it, with what you've got to work with.
Ok, so you want to do a street diorama. Add a streetlight to the diorama - this will solve most of your problems. Add a magnet to the light portion of the pole. In the car, under the roof, add a second magnet with the attracting pole facing up. The is will create a pull between the two magnets.
secure the car to the base with a length of invisible thread or 1lb fishing line, in the middle of the bottom of the car. It'll be almost impossible to see and you don't have to worry about the car flying off. You'll achieve your illusion and it will be infinitely easier and cheaper than experimenting, only to come to the same conclusion.
-Fred
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