Homopolar Motor With Five Speed Manual Stick-Shift

This video show how to build a homopolar motor that's really different...it's got a five-speed shifter!

The homopolar motor is the simplest design electrical motor in the world. It uses a battery, a neodymium magnet and a wire. Usually, either the copper wire or the magnet rotates. In this case the battery rotates.

Here, I've used a battery, a neo magnet, and a copper wire wrapped around a coat-hanger. The coat-hanger acts as both electrical connection and support for the hanging battery. Coins are used to change speeds of the rotating "battery-plus-change" motor.

I've been recently told that US coins, being non-magnetic, won't work for this Instructable. (Sorry about that!) Perhaps the US coins could be glued together to make it work. Furthermore, some Canadian pennies are magnetic and some are not.

You can order the BEST neodymium super-magnets from K&J Magnetics here.

See more of my homopolar motor videos at :
http://ca.youtube.com/MrfixitRick