The over-unity machine: a wheel that powers itself and gives energy for free. Every version fails at the same wall — the energy ledger. The First Law forbids getting out more than you put in; the Second guarantees some always leaks to heat and friction, so a real machine’s efficiency is always BELOW 1. Slide the claimed efficiency and watch it hit the wall. Verdict: DEBUNKED.
Conservation of energy (First Law): E out ≤ E in for any closed cycle — you cannot create energy. The Second Law makes it strict: every real cycle sheds entropy as waste heat, so efficiency η = E out/E in is strictly < 1, and no machine returns to its start having done net work on the world for free. Claims of η ≥ 1 (over-unity) are unmeasured, mis-measured, or hidden-input every time examined. A fail-loud self-check throws unless the modelled machine’s output is strictly less than its input. ◆ VERDICT: DEBUNKED — by the most-tested laws in physics.
The ledger is a model of a real cycle (fixed friction/heat loss); the LAW it illustrates is exact and universal. ‘Debunked’ here means ‘forbidden by conservation + the Second Law’, the strongest kind — not merely ‘none built yet’.