Patent ID: 6978611

Claim:
A heat engine for converting thermal energy to mechanical work, the heat engine comprising: a chamber containing a motive medium; means for alternately enabling and disabling conductive transfer of thermal energy from a heat source to the motive medium; and at least one movable side of the chamber that moves in response to thermally-induced volumetric changes in the motive medium; wherein the chamber consists essentially of a single closed chamber; further comprising: means for positioning the chamber away from a base that faces the single closed chamber, wherein the base is a heat source; a motion capacitor having a chamber plate disposed on a bottom surface of the chamber, wherein the bottom surface is at least one heat transfer side of the chamber, and an opposed base plate disposed on a top surface of the base; and means for placing the chamber plate alternately into and out of contact with the opposed base plate, thereby alternately enabling and disabling the conductive transfer of thermal energy from the heat source to the motive medium.