What is the largest mass ever lifted by a man-made magnet?

Hamlet.

This man discusses the possibility of a magnet of such strength being able to lift a piece of spinich! He says the largest magnet he is aware of is 35 Tesla (a unit used to measure magnetic strength). http://www.madsci.org/posts/archives/mar99/92118528 Sep 24 03, 12:06 PM

sequoianoir

I have found references to the largest, heaviest and strongest magnetic devices ever made and magnetic fields ever created but they are all used for medical (MRI scanners etc.) and scientific purposes (cyclotrons and similar). The last thing they are used for is trying to lift large steel objects. Given that a crane at a scrapyard near where I live, has an electromagnet no bigger than a dustbin lid on the end of its cables, and tosses cars weighing around 2 tons like a feather on a piece of string, I cannot see why this is not many tens of tons. If the magnet were the size of the car it lifts, it could easily handle 200 tons or more. Of course, you then need a crane and cables that can do the same. However most electromagnetic lifting devices are FAILSAFE so that they are magnetic when there is no power, otherwise, unless you are moving worthless scrap which doesn't matter if you drop it and no one is going to be injured in the event of a powerfailure, the electromagnetic coils neutralise the permanent magnet that actually does the lifting to release the object. So normally a permanent magnet would lift heavy objects even if it is a man-made one. Sep 24 03, 2:00 PM

gmackematix

Magnetism isn't my strong field and I need to refresh myself on flux density, field strengths, etc. I can't get Hamlet's link to work but I do recall work being done on magnets so strong that they can levitate fairly non-metallic objects (such as human beings). Come to think about it, even more impressive than the scrapyard magnets are the maglev rails which levitate entire trains full of people. Sep 24 03, 8:25 PM

Hamlet.

Sorry my site doesn't work, it seems to be a weakness of this New AFT (well, I guess its not that "New" anymore) reference sites typed just don't cooperate like they use to... Anyway, the whole point of the site was that because Spinich contains a good deal of Iron, then theoretically a strong enough magnet could lift it...clever, huh. Sep 24 03, 9:47 PM

sequoianoir

You seem to be missing a bit of the url - try this http://www.madsci.org/posts/archives/mar99/921185284.Ph.r.html Sep 25 03, 6:30 AM

gmackematix

The whole spinach-iron myth came about because of a misprint in nutritional information many years ago. This happened to be read by the creator of Popeye... Sep 25 03, 12:41 PM