Category: Possible inventions

I’m fascinated by the mechanics of ice crystal formation.

The final, unique shape of one such crystal is a representation of its personal history as it falls through temperature and humidity gradients.

Today’s invention is a system which injects pure, hexagonal seed crystals into an engineering airflow stream at different points and then, by automated image analysis, determines statistically what gradients they have each encountered.

This provides a new form of flow monitoring for low-temperature systems.

When using a tripod to take photographs, its positioning tends to dominate the composition.

Today’s invention helps with this by allowing an interior photographer to place his camera wherever required and then extend two scissorlike mechanisms upwards and downwards before locking them in place.

The pads on either end help to form a rigid bridge between floor and ceiling, allowing images to be captured from the desired location and then quickly repositioned.

Many cities are divided by a wall or a fence intended to keep warring factions separate. Often, the warring is not being done by inhabitants but by gangsters or zealots who have a vested interest in maintaining a culture of fear on their side of the barrier.

Today’s invention is a door which can be placed in any such wall at multiple locations by the government which installs it. Each door has two apertures, each with a very heavy-duty lock and also a lockable porthole.

Many keys would be quietly distributed for each door among the people living on that side.

After a period of mistrust, people may develop curiosity about the others on the other side of the divide and, without being controlled by the local mobsters, they can gradually open the porthole and take a peek. Children might begin to leave notes in the internal space and the portholes may one day be opened simultaneously, allowing a low-threat way for people to see each other.

Eventually, locals may decide that they are ready to open their door briefly. Doing so, noisily, allows the others to consider their position too. When several doors have been left open for a while the power of the local thugs on both sides is diminished and trust may be given a chance.

On beaches which are so popular and dangerous as to warrant lifeguards, I’m concerned that the whole lifesaving thing relies on having beefy swimmers plough out through the waves to reach anyone in trouble.

Rather than waste this time, today’s invention is a tall, whippy tower with a rotating hinge mechanism at the bottom, unlike the normal watchtowers.

A lifeguard would perch at the top of this so as to be able to scan a very significant length of beach. On spotting someone in difficulties, the tower could be pointed in the right direction and allowed to hinge forward -throwing the guard more than 50 yards offshore and thus greatly speeding his or her rescue attempts.

If necessary, a line could link guard to the gantry, enabling both saved and saviour to be lifted ashore fast.

Loose change is generally a nuisance -especially the brown shrapnel kind.

Today’s invention is to create coins which each contain a bar magnet. This would allow all coins automatically to align themselves into a convenient column within someone’s pocket. No more rattling during presentations and, when you need to spend some change, just flip the required coins off the top of the stack.

If you wanted to go one step further, you could have slightly dished coins so that these could be arranged, partly overlapping each other, in the form of a bracelet or necklace.

UAVs are getting smarter individually but there are still opportunities for cleverness in the ways they interact.

Today’s invention is a way to build larger autonomous aircraft by having conventional ones join up in flight. Each vehicle would have eg electromagnetic patches on the wingtips, enabling autonomous docking without ultraprecise manoeuvring.

As with migrating geese, this would help with fuel efficiency when flying long distances. In the event that such a swarm of vehicles were attacked, any damaged ones could be disengaged very rapidly and a new configuration automatically adopted.

This robustness could be further enhanced by having these machines duplicate each other’s gathered data, exchange fuel in flight and adapt their grouping shape and sizes to minimise detectability.

We hear a lot these days about cars which can automatically apply the brakes and swerve to avoid collisions.

Today’s invention is a variant on that theme. The vehicle would be designed with special structural impact points built in around its bodywork. These would be capable of absorbing an enormous amount of energy, but be sparsely enough distributed so as to avoid a large weight increase.

When the usual onboard system sensed an unavoidable collision, the steering would be taken over, at the last few milliseconds, so as to actively drive the vehicle to impact on one of these strongpoints.

Just when you thought that Polaroids were finished with…
today’s invention is a low-cost sunburn avoidance tool.

A Polaroid sheet is tightly clamped within a container using a grid of bars which separate the sheet into separate windows. Each window has a light-impermeable hatch.

When sitting on the beach, one window containing a reference colour would be opened. The adjacent window would then be opened, exposing a calibrated square of film to the sun’s rays.

When the film square and the calibrated colour become visually indistinguishable, it’s time to head inside.

Much as I love the idea of the paperless office, I know better than to think it’s happening anytime soon.

Today’s invention is a laptop the (strongly built) hinge action of which can be used to