Fontaine de Galilée

About

The Galileo fountain or Galileo ball is a structure set up in the Parc du Près-La-Rose in Montbéliard. It consists of a granite sphere of nearly one metre in diameter placed in a base. Despite its mass exceeding one ton, a simple hydraulic device even allows a child to rotate it.

It was built in the Vosges and laid on Tuesday 30 April 1991 in the Parc du Près-La-Rose in Montbéliard. Designed in pure Swedish granite with a mass of around 1,500 kg, it required the use of a 60-ton crane for its operation. The principle is quite simple as a whole, based on the principle of a straight, uniform and constant movement due to the elimination of friction forces.

Although quite understandable, this installation is still quite impressive by its conception and by the physical laws on which it is based.