On Jun 2, 2007, at 2:59 PM, Harry Veeder wrote:
According to the logic of Newton's laws of motion, the ions have to
remain
immobile to be able to pull the ball forward. However, the forward
motion
the ball will in turn be impeded by the ions immobility.
Therefore, the ball should not move according to Newton.
This is not so. It is only necessary that the ions be accelerated
toward the ping pong balls. Newton gives
F = m a
so, given a force and ion mass:
a = F/m
and we can calculate the ion acceleration. This acceleration means
the ions only have a fleeting existence in front of the balls. The
ions in front of the ping pong balls have to be continually
replenished to sustain a fixed force, i.e. a space charge has to be
maintained, but the radial ion wind does this replenishing.
Regards,
Horace Heffner
