How to Cook an Egg with Magnets

Have you lost your voice from cooking eggs by screaming at them? Fear not—the folks at the magnet supplier KJ Magnetics have found an even more obscure way to make breakfast.

By combining an old treadmill motor and a magnet array, these magnet aficionados were able to generate enough heat to fry an egg in a conductive pan.

In the KJ Magnetics set up, the treadmill motor is attached to the bottom of a table and a small disk is placed on the motor. Around the center of the disk are ten magnets placed in such a way that their poles alternate. The magnets are each about ten times stronger than a typical refrigerator magnet.

When the magnets are spinning, their alternating poles mean that the magnetic field they generate is constantly changing. This produces a type of electricity called an eddy current which flows into the conductive pan and dissipates energy as heat.

During the folks at KJ Magnetics conducted their first test, the pan only rose to about 100 degrees Fahrenheit—not enough to cook an egg. When they nearly doubled the strength of the magnets, however, they were able to increase the temperature to over 212 degrees Fahrenheit and successfully cook an egg over easy.

If you feel like making an inductive stove yourself, KJ Magnetics have created a how-to guide.