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[–] 91 points 2 years ago (4 children)

This looks like the magnetic version of pulling yourself up by the bootstraps.

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  • [–] 65 points 2 years ago (4 children)

    The car is also made out of metal. Why do you need the metal in front?

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  • [–] 19 points 2 years ago

    The actual metal content varies. With plastic bumpers, aluminum condenser/radiator, composite support pieces, the actual amount of magnetic metal may be quite minimal, and there's practically no vehicles that have so much metal in their front end to compare to a slab of metal on the outside.

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  • [–] 52 points 2 years ago

    Because the hand brake is still pulled, dummie

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  • [–] 39 points 2 years ago* (10 children)

    Issac Newton would like to have a word.

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  • [–] [S] 31 points 2 years ago (9 children)
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  • [–] 37 points 2 years ago (6 children)
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    [–] 37 points 2 years ago

    Archimedes once said something like: "Give me a big enough lever and a place to stand, and I shall move the Earth."

    The "place to stand" part is just as critical as the lever part. You gotta have something to push off of in order to move other things. This is a closed system that pushes and pulls only against itself.

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  • [–] 35 points 2 years ago* (2 children)

    Back where I'm from the elders used to call this kind of thing "bait for social media interaction"

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    [–] 35 points 2 years ago (2 children)

    Simple. The magnet weighs less than the car, so the magnet is going to be moving to the left. If the force is going to the left, that means the car can only go in reverse.

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  • [–] 23 points 2 years ago (25 children)

    I am a complete idiot and I would also like to know.

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  • [–] 68 points 2 years ago* (6 children)

    Newton's third law. Every action has an equal and opposite reaction.

    Basically what that means is if the magnet is exerting some amount of force on the truck to pull it towards it, the truck is exerting the exact same amount of force on the magnet in the opposite direction to pull the magnet closer to the truck. This is why when you let go of two magnets they fly towards each other instead of one staying still (unless you hold it still) and the other flying towards it.

    If the arm in the picture could bend, the magnet would just stick to the front bumper. If it couldn't move, the magnet would pull on the plate, but that would be cancelled out by the plate pulling on the magnet. They're trying to attract each other, but neither of them can move, so it just stays still.

    Now, if the magnet was attached to a different truck, and that started moving, it would pull the truck along just fine. If the second truck was in neutral, it'd roll backwards and the two trucks would meet in the middle. But if you wanted them both to go, you'd have to turn on the engine in the second truck, and you've effectively just invented the world's least reliable tow hook. You can't cause a car to accelerate without some outside force (the second truck's engine) pulling it along.

    Newton's third law also applies to gravity. When the Earth's gravitational pull makes something fall to the ground, that something actually exerts the same amount of force pulling the Earth towards it. The earth is several orders of magnitude heavier, though, so it doesn't move very much. Gravity from the moon pulling on water in the ocean does create the tides, though.

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  • [–] 8 points 2 years ago (5 children)

    If the arm in the picture could bend, the magnet would just stick to the front bumper

    What if the magnet was of similar mass to the truck? Assuming it could be made to balance, maybe this actually might work to move the truck such that it meets the magnet in the middle. Then the arm could slide the magnet upwards to detach, reposition it, and repeat. Of course, there are much better ways to make a truck move, but maybe it could work?

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  • [–] 20 points 2 years ago (1 child)

    Then the arm could slide the magnet upwards to detach, reposition it, and repeat.

    This would work, but this is the point where you'd need to involve an external energy source. If you move the truck-magnet-arm system such that the whole system reaches a steady state and the truck has "moved" (relative to an outside observer), to continue any motion, you need to disturb the steady state to reposition the arm and create a new resting point. Doing so would require energy. From a battery, or an engine, or whatever, but you need energy from an external source. And so we're right back to where we started: instead of all this jazz, why not just spend energy to spin the wheels instead?

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  • [–] 6 points 2 years ago*

    In simple terms: metal is just as much attracted to magnet as magnet is to metal, this is fundamental and doesn't change under any circumstances.

    So the force driving the car forward is exactly equal to the force driving the car backward, and you can't have one without the other.

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    [–] 20 points 2 years ago

    Newton’s third law would like to have a word with you 🫠

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  • [–] 20 points 2 years ago (1 child)

    Because the truck wouldn't be loud and obnoxious so no Truck person would ever drive it

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    [–] 19 points 2 years ago (1 child)

    This is basically how you build a warp drive in Kerbal Space Program

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    [–] 16 points 2 years ago (1 child)

    Why put metal in front of a car that‘s made out of… metal?

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  • [–] 15 points 2 years ago (1 child)
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    [–] 12 points 2 years ago

    The force pulling the car to the magnet is the same as the magnet pulling towards the car. These two forces cancel out each other.

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  • [–] 11 points 2 years ago* (1 child)

    It would work much better with a carrot and a pig.

    https://youtu.be/3hPboNpHKfw

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    [–] 11 points 2 years ago

    Ok one reason… physics.

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  • [–] 7 points 2 years ago (3 children)

    Why do you put metal on front? The car is already metalic

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  • [–] 7 points 2 years ago

    Draw a force diagram. Then bing perpetual machines.

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  • [–] 6 points 2 years ago

    Conservation of momentum

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