Don Firth: A friend of mine in St. Louis once showed me a "perpetual motion machine" that he had inherited from an eccentric neighbor. It was very much like the one you described. Of course, it didn't work either, but the maker believed he just had to keep working on it. Too bad he died before he perfected it.

The builder (my friend's neighbor) was a notorious eccentric known as Highway Mike. (I have forgotten his real name.) His other obsession, besides building a perpetual motion machine, was highway safety. He believed the local freeways were too dangerous because they didn't have enough reflectors and warning signs, so he would make them himself, out of old beer cans, and erect them along the sides of the freeways. (The bottoms of beer cans do make good reflectors if they're pointed the right direction.) Of course, the Highway Department would always take them down. He would also show up at any city planning meeting to complain about the state of the roads. When he died, the St. Louis Post Dispatch printed a nice obituary. I looked for it, and couldn't find it.

Maybe someone should start a thread called "Eccentrics I have known."