sounds easy enough to design. I don't cook so much, but a pot that stirs itself would probably sell. Batteries or a cord?

hi

thanks for your feedback i was more thinking it should be something like a wound up key so that its power independent just wind it up like a clock and let it stir in that way there is no battery or power dependent

I've designed a wind-up mechanism before and I think you'll discover that it has lots of pit-falls. Controlling speed is the first. Fan-type governers or fly-ball governers work, but waste your precious power. In your initial proposal, you said you wanted speed control. Harder to do with a wind-up.

Also, to store any significant power, you need a big spring--these are dangerous and require significant metal parts to hold them because they have larger forces.

Maybe more costly than a motor, but no risk of electrocution and no dead batteries.

Still, I think it's do-able.

BTW, a quick bit of research about this finds that there are many stirring hotplates availible on ebay, apparently designed for chemistry labs.

Also, this sort of idea has been on whynot in the guise of a tilting-stir hotplate.

http://www.whynot.net/ideas/369

Finally, it occurs to me that the best method to power your self-stirring pot would be to somehow use the heat from the burner to supply the energy. Possibly it would heat a chamber of air that would then supply pneumatic pressure, then the air 'motor' would open a valve to let in more air--like a little sort of a pulse-jet.

hi

thanks for your research the bottom line we need to come up with an device that does this self stirring with out too many moving parts and easily integratable to existing pots and pans will keep working on it if you have any other way to do it let me know we can work on it together

thanks !

rxs0005

Not to steal my own thunder, but the solution to an expansion engine driven by heat isn't that hard.

Just use a wankel rotary engine, but with the intake and the exhaust portions . Only the compression portion of the cycle would need to be 'sealed.' Only two moving parts, the rotor and the shaft. I might even recommend that the rotor be mounted with high-strength magnets, not the center shaft. The magnets would have their mates on an fully immersible, washable impeller that would go into a standard pan, like the chemistry stirring systems.

You'd control the speed of the stirring with a simple needle-valve type throttle on the intake, which should generally keep it from speeding up even when it gets hotter. YOu'd stop it with a brake (if that's necessary, or just lift the pan.

just FYI, I started to sketch my idea of a two-expansion-chamber pulse-jet engine and saw right away that it would be a wankel if it had three chambers. Did a quick patent search and see that it seems to have been first patented in 1971, more than the 17-year length of the patent.