Possible inventions – Page 28 – Invention Of The Day

Archive by category "Possible inventions" (Page 28)

#2284: SpringLimb

Today’s invention is an alternative prosthetic limb attachment.

A user would have ferrous discs screwed into the bone of the affected limb (red). The tissue would heal over, lessening the risk of infection, when compared eg to titanium rods which protrude through the skin.

A close fitting ‘boot’ would encase the stump…but much less tightly than conventional equipment which often restricts air movement to the skin.

The boot would be slipped on over the stump. A motorised screw device would then be used to insert these magnets (blue) into locations in the boot walls, under control to avoid bruising.

In use, the stump would be held firmly in an equilibruim position.

A small amount of springy, vertical movement provided by the magnetic field would add to the comfort of wearing it.

#2283: HotDrawn

There is a large amount of discussion online about this brilliant idea for drawing in 3D.

Today’s invention is a simpler approach to the same task.

A pen has a reel of common-or-garden fast-melt plastic ‘wire’ at one end. The reel is motor driven so that depressing a button forces the plastic out at the writing end as a (solid) straight line.

Another button causes a small heater to rapidly soften (or melt) a very short section of the wire -just as it emerges (which is a lot simpler than having to use plastic which melts and then solidifies in milliseconds).

This allows changes of direction and bonding between preexisting drawing and newly-emerged material.

The next step would be to attach this devide to a robot arm and do simple 3D printing at high speed.

#2282: SpinWings

It seems that DARPA have identified a requirement to fly high-payload UAV missions from ships too small to accommodate normal takeoffs.

Today’s invention attempts to address that requirement (but without having to fill in their million pages of paperwork).

A cylindrical UAV fuselage has wings attached with variable pitch.

This machine is loaded into a mast (grey) which is then hoisted into a vertical position on the deck somewhere.

A cable around the cylinder is withdrawn, by a deck motor, very fast so that the entire drone spins out of the mast and into the sky. (Sensitive equipment would be located along the cylinder axis to minimise rotational acceleration effects).

At this point, one of the wings rotates about its axis into the same aerofoil configuration as the other and the red tailfins extend from the fuselage.

The internal jet engine fires up, the cylinder aligns itself horizontally, like a plane, and the system then does whatever democracy requires.

On return to the ship, the UAV reverts to helicopter mode and undertakes a remotely controlled descent into the conical mast collector.

#2280: Social Ties

Manufacturers are always attempting to engage buyers with their products via social networking.

Today’s invention deals with that issue in the style-conscious world of sneaker design.

Sneakers would come with a box of flat, coloured tubes (like heat shrink material).

These would be slotted onto laces to form a colourful pattern (after being allocated a unique one from the manufacturer’s website).

People with their own pattern could then use their smartphone to image the ‘barcodes’ formed by the laces to get access to the online profiles of other wearers of this design.

This would allow people to make friends, get dates etc. Bad behaviour would be limited by the identifiability of all wearers of this design.

A six-lace, five-colour arrangement would allow about 240 million different codes.

#2277: Chewhistle

Having a toy-oriented dog can be a nuisance when their favourite is a squeaky bone or ball.

Today’s invention is therefore a ball with a high-frequency whistle embedded.

As the canine in question gnashes on his rubber pal, air is driven through the whistle.

This generates sound at such a high frequency that only he (and the other neighbourhood mutts) can hear…thus maintaining some measure of domestic quietude.

#2276: PackAging

It’s one thing to put unhealthy products like cigarettes in ugly packaging, but today’s invention seeks to get the message across in a more personal way.

When someone buys a pack of cigarettes from a vending machine, a photograph would be taken of them, by the machine.

This would then be processed in realtime to simulate the aging effects of tobacco usage and the resulting image printed onto the package.

A more positive marketing message might be used on healthy products, except that the image there would show some automatic wrinkle removal, eye whitening etc.

#2274: ShiftKeys

Today’s invention is yet another attempt to alleviate my difficulties with the infernal interface known as the keyboard.

Imagine if the keys were attached to an underlying steel plate by magnets and were each fitted on a tiny cart so that they were capable of being driven rapidly to different positions on the plane (perhaps by altering the magnetic field in the plate).

The keys would move from their default qwerty layout, driven by a predictive-text spellchecker algorithm.

In this way, if my fingers are about to eg end the word ‘unlikely’ with a ‘t’ instead of a ‘y’ the y key could physically push its way under my erring finger, instead of the t.

#2272: Surf-ace

Today’s invention is a training aid for surfboarders.

When the weather is too fierce, the surf’s not up or experience is lacking, it offers a ‘dry-slope’ for exponents of this sport.

A cylinder of carpet-like material with a low-friction coating on the outside is supported in a base shaped as shown.

An internal drum rotates, moving the carpet so that it flops inwards on the upper surface, to a degree.

This allows surfers to place their board on the crest of the wave and surf continuously as the carpet rotates.

#2270: PuppetPlane

I always liked to suspend my model planes from clear threads hanging from the ceiling.

Technology has moved forward a lot since I was a boy modelmaker, though.

Today’s invention is a quadrocopter which can support a model aircraft (say 1/72nd scale) via a few fishing lines.

This can be programmed to skim the ceiling in a preset flight pattern, bringing to life such models in a way that no static stand or display case can…especially if the model has a motor-driven propeller.

A more advanced version would involve two such ‘copters whose aircraft would chase each other overhead.

#2269: Avalauncher

Skiers and mountaineers are often at the mercy of avalanches.

Today’s invention provides wthem with a NASA-specification escape technology.

In the same way that space vehicles usually carry an escape rocket on the nose, people in the mountains could take poles each of which contain a small hybrid rocket motor.

In the moments that they sense an avalanche has begun, each user would plant one pole in the ground and stand on the disk at the base, holding the handgrip which houses the rocket start button.

The motor could be fired when an acoustic sensor detected the onrush of snow from above, but manual firing would probably be preferred.

This would lift the user say 10 metres into the air so that they could avoid the vast majority of the wall of snow and ice. They would land on softer material and be less likely to be submerged.

The rocket motor could then be used as both a lance with which to melt any surrounding snow and a signal when they emerged from the drifts.

Category: Possible inventions