"A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step," according to a wiser man from a much earlier time than this. I would make the humble and obvious addition that: "Every journey, be it long or short, begins from where you are at that point in time."

This all started when I bemoaned the fact that too many people in the world lacked adequate food, water, and shelter when we already have the technology to solve these problems.

The trigger, as you might expect, was the accelerating cost of purchased energy in the USA – and my realization that even economically advantaged populations could experience a real and substantial reduction in standard of living if new ways were not found to meet needs.

I realized that I had the solution to part of one of the problems: I knew how to construct solar heating panels capable of keeping a structure warm through the winter without needing any kind of purchased fuel (or energy derived from purchased fuel), and that the cost of implementing that solution was small compared to the costs and consequences of other solutions.

I knew I didn't have a perfect solution, but I felt close enough to be confident of being able refine my approach so as to come close to "practically perfect". I'm satisfied that I've succeeded – although I'm confident that further refinements are both possible and probable.

Having made what I felt was significant progress on one major part of the shelter problem, I asked myself where I should direct my efforts next. By happy coincidence, a friend rekindled an old interest in Stirling engines and got me all excited about fluidynes. Since I was already working with solar heat – and a Stirling cycle engine runs on heat – it seemed like a logical direction to explore.

What excited me about fluidynes was their simplicity and ease of construction. Their only moving parts are a gas and a fluid – air and water work perfectly well. They can be easily constructed using commonly available materials by non-technical people without expensive tooling, and should have extremely long lifetimes with, for all practical purposes, no maintenance other than replacement of any water that escapes by evaporation.

Well, now that we know these things have some really desirable characteristics, how do we put 'em to work? A basic fluidyne can convert heat energy into mechanical energy and delivers that mechanical energy to a rising and falling fluid piston. In simplest terms, it alternately sucks and blows – with as much power as we design and build into it, so long as there's an adequate supply of heat.

If we add a pair of check valves to limit flow to one direction only, it will function as a self-priming pump to move anything from cement to air. If we use it to pump water, then it can serve as an irrigation pump, a village drinking water supply pump, or a flood control and recovery pump. If we use it to pump cold water, it can serve as a circulator for a refrigeration or daytime air-conditioning system

Which leads directly into another aspect of Stirling cycle engines: if a Stirling cycle engine is driven with mechanical energy rather than heat, it has the interesting characteristic of operating as a heat pump – it will move heat from one part of the engine (which then becomes cooler) to another part of the engine (which then becomes warmer). To drive a fluidyne with mechanical energy to make a heat pump, we need to alternately suck and blow on what would normally be the output piston.

By a not-so-incredible coincidence, the most natural way to do that is to use fluidynes in pairs by connecting their output pistons and by driving the first engine with (solar) heat to produce mechanical energy that then drives the second engine, turning the second engine into a heat pump with, as described above, a hot part and a cold part. From the hot part, we can either discard or re-cycle the heat – and we can use the cold part as the core for a refrigerator or an air-conditioner. If we're willing to get a little crazy about this approach, we can use a third fluidyne (as a pump) to circulate either cold air chilled water.

Back to the original fluidyne that doesn't do anything but suck and blow: If we fit the output tube with a piston with a connecting rod (somewhat like an automotive piston and its connecting rod) we can convert "suck and blow" into "push and pull" to have either back-and-forth motion or, if the connecting rod is attached to a crankshaft, we can have rotary motion.

The back-and-forth motion can be used, for example, to produce electricity using a linear alternator by moving a source of magnetism back and forth within a coil (or vice versa, to move the coil back and forth within a magnetic field).

The rotary motion can be used in any of the variety of ways we use electric motors currently. I won't even try to make a list here – it'd be too long and I think my point is already made.

An efficient solar heating panel can contribute significantly to standard of living by improving quality of shelter. A solar-powered pump can provide water for improved agricultural productivity and to lighten the burden of those who currently hand- (or head-) carry water from source to home. Solar refrigeration can provide safe storage for food and medicine where there is no infrastructure to support any other means of refrigeration. Solar-powered air-conditioning can cool homes, classrooms, and clinics where it would otherwise be unaffordable; and it can save energy, eliminate pollution, and reduce costs in already-developed areas.

The solar panel design is mature and proven. The first of the fluidynes have been tested and found promising. This web site has been put together and has been receiving steadily increasing numbers of hits by interested individuals and businesses – so I no longer have that worrisome feeling that I'm all alone out in the middle of nowhere doing something no one cares about.

I'd like to make full plans freely available for everything I've been working on, and continue to do that with future developments. So far, I've felt unable to do that because if I did, not only would I not have enough revenue for the R&D effort, but I wouldn't even be able to continue producing and selling solar panels. I'd like to get back to the original problems: food, water, and shelter – and I'd like to carry on that effort full-time – and I'd like to be able to hire the right people to help make the effort march "quickstep".

I don't feel comfortable asking people to send in individual donations, nor do I want to think of myself (or have anyone else think of me) as a charity case, but I would like to find some corporate sponsors who, along with finding "enough geothermal energy to heat six million homes", would like to be a part of and be credited on download pages with helping heat a hundred times that six million homes with locally-constructed solar heating panels, with helping to provide fresh water to at least sixty million families in undeveloped areas, and with helping to boost agricultural productivity worldwide with solar-powered irrigation pumps.

If you find any of this worthwhile – and if you know of any sponsor candidates, please make them aware and encourage their participation.

Thanks!