#2767: ThermaLock

Today’s invention offers a way to ensure that padlocks, which often freeze up when left outside in winter, can still be unlocked.

The mechanism itself, within the main body of the lock, would be surrounded by a layer of insulating material.

The lock would be supplied with a toothed band that is dragged repeatedly across a toothed wheel, so as to accelerate a small flywheel inside the lock.

Once this is moving very fast, a brake mechanism is engaged and the kinetic energy is then used to heat up the lock mechanism with which it’s in direct contact. This allows the key to be inserted and turned.

#2766: Rollreverse

If you have a heavy motorcycle, it’s easy to find yourself parked facing down a hill, towards a fence, with no way to move the bike backwards.

Today’s invention provides your bike with an emergency reverse gear.

With the bike on the centre stand, wedge the roller under the rear wheel.

Attach two ratchet straps to the centre stand hinge and tighten.

Sit on the bike and gingerly let out the clutch, so that the rotation of the rear wheel drives the roller and the bike moves a metre or two backwards, allowing your escape.

The system is small and light enough to fit in a topbox.

(I just discovered this!)

#2765: Escelerator

The main reason that escalators and moving walkways can’t travel very much faster is that you can’t ask pedestrians to step off a still floor onto a high speed moving platform.

Today’s invention solves that issue by providing a number of separate conveyors, each travelling slightly faster than the one before (at the loading end -and vv at the unloading end).

(I’ve just been told that something like this idea appears in a book by Philip K Dick, so it may not be original after all).

#2764: Vacuumobility

Today’s invention is an aftermarket, wheeled cradle for eg the Henry vacuum cleaner, which performs a number of extra functions:
1. It widens the wheelbase, so that slight tugs on the hose don’t cause it to capsize infuriatingly.

2. It contains a battery and transformer so that both the cleaner’s motor and the cradle itself can be powered wirelessly. A small pull on the hose causes the cradle to move forward in that direction.

This could allow a conventional vacuum cleaner to act as autonomously as eg a Roomba.

As a further refinement, we might do away with the cradle’s powered wheels and instead equip the cleaner with the ability to push itself around using very high speed bursts of blown air from the ‘vacuum’.

#2763: Rotorescue

Rescue helicopters can end up spinning a stretcher suspended beneath them, like this.

Today’s invention is a fan unit which attaches to one end of a stretcher and which blows air in the opposite direction to the helicopter’s main rotor motion.

This prevents the stretcher from spinning, just as the tail rotor does for the machine itself.

#2762: Excafetor

I’ll admit to liking strong coffee. This usually results in formation of a solid plug of compressed grounds in my cafetiere, which is always a pain to extract.

Today’s invention is a simple blade (red) which attaches to the underside of the filter, so that when the coffee is made, the blade ends up embedded in the grounds.

To make fresh coffee, rotate the plunger with blade attached. This will disrupt the plug and make it simpler to get recaffeinated rapidly.

#2761: TrumpTrunk

I’m surprised I can’t find this anywhere.

Today’s invention is an extra long tie which can be threaded through the lining of a suit jacket breast pocket, so that its end provides a perfectly matching pocket square.

(I’m told that having these two items in the same material is considered a grave fashion faux-pas, but it’s not my first).

#2760: Bloweracer

You can now get some seriously complicated running machines. Some of these have screens to simulate the effects of many virtual competitors.

Today’s invention is an addition to one of these which consists of a high powered fan with variable air temperature.

This is powerful enough to simulate the effects of drag and windchill on an athlete, without the need for a fullscale wind tunnel.

It could also be used to train athletes in connection with tactics -such as ‘drafting’ runner(s) ahead before pulling out to overtake (or by sucking, the influence of a strong tailwind).

A more advanced version would be a treadmill with powered wheels so that a group of these machines could change their relative positions to model the way runners contend for track space in a real race.

#2759: TileTrial

For somebody who dislikes jigsaws as much as me, I seem to spend a lot of time thinking about them.

I’m tired of seeing adverts for the world’s hardest jigsaw puzzle.

Today’s invention is a seriously difficult challenge.

Take your image and cut it into the usual pieces. Then take another version of the same image (cardboard is dirt cheap) and repeat the process using a different pattern of cut pieces.

Add both sets of pieces to a single box and sell.

I think that should keep puzzlers busy for a while. even after they have one image complete (which will involve up to (2N)! trial fits for an N-piece image), they still have another puzzle to solve.

#2758: Vectairing

I have a very limited understanding of rules in general. Formula 1 rules are a particular mystery, and yet it’s often by bending these that teams win. Sometimes a tiny change can have a large effect.

Today’s invention is a subtle change which might give someone a worthwhile advantage (and which may only be allowed in certain forms of motor racing).

As the green car travels around the grey curve, its air intake (blue, towards the back of the car) is at a slight angle to the direction of motion (red).

Having an intake which can swivel automatically, so as to continually align with the direction of motion would give a very small, but perhaps important, increase in airflow and thus performance.