Magnetic Chaotic Pendulum: this beautifully designed “perpetual pendulum” has been in my collection since 1990. The ufo shaped bob has a magnet embedded in it and the base has a battery and simple coil circuit that gives the bob a tiny push each time it swings through the center. An array of 5 permanent magnets are also hidden in the wood base (wait for reveal with magnetic viewing film) and these magnets produce the chaotic motion- not random, but very sensitive to slight differences in initial

Magnetic Breaking Pendulum: The moving magnetic field from the swinging magnet produces electric currents in the copper- these currents then produce magnetic fields that oppose the motion of the moving field, a specific application of Faraday’s law of induction called Lenz’s Law. So a moving magnet makes the copper slab briefly into an electromagnet that creates a field that opposes the pendulum’s motion. Note that if the copper slab is pulled away from the hanging magnet, the magnet tries to fo