Solar powered crude extraction

Ever noticed those pumps that pump crude oil are run by electric Motors? We should take the irony a step further and power it with my nifty solar heated metallic expansion engine.

The bimetallic strips are just 10-foot tall versions of the ones they have in thermostats. Running through the center of the coil is an axle. There is a one-way, ratchet cuff interfacing the coil with the axle (we will get to this,shortly).

There are actually 20 of these coils arranged 7 feet apart and anchored in concrete with fiberglass insulation plates to prevent heat transfer all the concrete. There are canopies above some of the coils. As the sun moves over head, the alternating areas of shade move causing some coils to expand while others contract. The expanding force is isolated from the axle by way of the aforementioned ratcheting cuff. The contracting force is transferred to the axle by the ratchet cuff.

At the opening, when people ask you about why it's pumping oil, tell them about how you could only get funding for the sculpture because you said it was an oil pump motor.