The advanced student looking for a spectacular science fair project can’t go wrong by constructing the 60-cycle repulsion coil resonance engine described in the March 1964 issue of Popular Electronics. Essentially, it’s a coil and capacitor tuned to be resonant at exactly 60 Hz. The cover photo above shows the coil being used to repel a two-inch piece of aluminum tubing.

The device is called an engine because it can be used as shown to the left, with a reciprocating piston driving a flywheel. As with any single piston engine, to get started it requires a spin to get started, unless it happens to be in just the right spot.

The author suggests a number of other experiments that can be done with the device, all of which we guarantee will bring home the blue ribbon.