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Madkite
Have you seen Eric Dolards videos you can get at http://www.borderlands.com/
He claims to create a longitudinal electric wave that travels faster than light. The videos also show up weird vacume penomenom when an odenery vacume light bumb is stimulated by a Tesla coil. Some of these findings verify Tesla's clames that he cold transmit power withought wires!! It shoulb be realised before anyone say's that you cant transmit power with convetional radio waves Tesla never intended to use them.
Good Elf
Hi Madkite,

Longitudinal electromagnetic radiation may occur provided this is measured in the near field or evanescent region of the source. The frequency of these oscillations will actually be very low and hence the EM Wavelength may actually be "quite large" of the order of Kilometers. Within that zone the EM phenomena can exceed the speed of light even be "infinite" in velocity. This is also leaving open the possibility that longitudinal propagation modes are also available. This is all inductive and dielectric field propagation theory and is very well known though highly out of favor because few applications utilize their effect. I feel certain these phenomena are the result of creation of branes of tremendous sizes that lead to some scary physics.

These entities are related to synthetic branes that penetrate to higher dimensions depending on their wavelength. I believe they couple forces that are related to gravity and to neutral fields of the Aharanov-Bohm Effect. All these ideas are waiting in the wings for an acceptance of the ideas of higher dimensions of String Theory.

As to Tesla... he was a genius and far ahead of his time. Perhaps too far ahead.

Cheers
solidspin
Good Elf -

These ideas seem testable, then. The brane theoretical framework having been rather thoroughly established, couldn't these ideas be testable? Some initial superluminal research has come out and seems, at least prima facie, credible.

Can you explain, however, why FTL wave propagation can occur???? That doesn't make any sense, though this is way beyond my skill sets. I am curious. This seems to be if not at odds, then at least beyond Maxwell.

-curiously spinning solids unsure.gif
WaterBreath
Regarding wireless power transmission....

If, as Good Elf has said, the wavelengths need to be so large, then it might be tough to get a useful amount of power transmitted this way, since EM energy goes down as wavelength goes up.

Anyone have any idea how much power is transmitted via a typical AM radio wave??? I understand they have "large" wavelengths on the order of a few hundred meters (or maybe its a few hundred feet).

The energy transmittable across a distance of, say, 10 km would be significantly lower still than that due to the wavelength necessary.... Unless of course there were "repeaters" along the way working kind of like how cell phone towers work. If each one is within one wavelength of the last, then theoretically you might be able to get the evanescent waves to "hop" from one to the next at near-instantaneous speeds. But I still have a feeling that to get useful power transmission, you'd need massively array of transmission antennae and a path clear of other entities capable of intercepting the EM signal. And if you need the path clear anyway, than all you're saving over wired means is maybe the material costs. And that would depend on the cost to build the repeater towers as opposed to stringing or burying cables.

Hmm... definitely some interesting ideas to toy with.
Good Elf
Hi Solidspin,

QUOTE
Good Elf -

These ideas seem testable, then. The brane theoretical framework having been rather thoroughly established, couldn't these ideas be testable? Some initial superluminal research has come out and seems, at least prima facie, credible.

Can you explain, however, why FTL wave propagation can occur???? That doesn't make any sense, though this is way beyond my skill sets. I am curious. This seems to be if not at odds, then at least beyond Maxwell.

This stuff has been known of for more than 1/2 a Century. Superluminal velocities within the evanescent range of a transmitter is a well known phenomena. Ask any "techs" who has experience of these matters. It is not "free" propagation inside that range. These are phenomena that are "inductive" or "dielectric" field effects at close range. Advanced and retarded potentials are at play there. Now Tesla dealt with transmitters in the Kilohertz range this means his wavelengths were quite massive. He could arrange nodes and antinodes to appear anywhere on the Earth's surface he wanted. This would lead to local potentials that could be harnessed using the ground plane. He did not use conventional antenna as we do today since he was dealing with mostly near-field phenomena.

FTL within the source is no surprise. Longitudinal EM Waves are also possible. I also predict that seen inside the braneworld of some branes... those virtual photons used to transfer forces in electromagnetics... have virtual mass and a range as well. The "s-particle" version of exchange forces. Just notice the forces that occur holding two bar magnets near each other and Forces lead to accelerations and accelerations are equivalent to gravitation according to General Relativity. Notice that it is impossible to measure these effects using current technologies, nobody has seen these "virtual photons" in action. This is not presently testable since to extract them from "braneworld" will alter the properties of those "s-particles" topologically into ordinary photon particles in our 3D + T Spacetime. They are turned "inside out" by a forced "supersymmetric" operation on the entity. You can do this with accelerators, but it is also why they are unable to see them as "s-particles". This is the wrong tool for the job. As I and others have said... to a particle physicist an accelerator is a "hammer" and all problems are "nails".

Now "String Theory" is just a paradigm dropped over this stuff and "must work" since it is based on existing theory. So wherever it agrees with current theory it must still do so when expressed in String Paradigm. The "interesting" stuff occurs where it is easy to predict divergences with current theory and this all occurs dealing with T-Duality and Supersymmetry and identification of those "s-particles". Higher dimensions are also a feature, probably the main one. What you are able to predict is that all theories in Physics will need to have those extra dimensions to be able to utilize "new physics". Think of it as an "upgrade". It all falls into place when you start to look at things using the paradigm. Suddenly you can identify stuff that the World cannot see. Talk about the "Emperor's New Clothes"... he he he!

Of course any good theory must be testable and it will work even with Quantum Electrodynamics. So this is the most readily available area where you can test and it is also the area where there will be the most number of applications. I have heard all the arguments about strings being smaller than the Planck Length but I also see Witten working with the electromagnetic branes. If it is nonsense why is he wasting his time on that for?

We are just talking about engineering branes not for transmission but for induction and for capacitance, they act on themselves as natures tank circuits I suppose, changing their own dimensional properties to exhibit "strings". The anti-de Sitter spaces of bosons have immense capacitance and modifies the geometry of those higher spaces such that they can be cavities and we all know what we can do with cavities.... they can be made to resonate. This is a "string" or a "brane"... it's just that to get all those neat properties you need to add dimensions to them.

The engineering of those "bosonic cavities" requires harnessing the ideas of higher complex spaces that is to use the extra six dimensions (or a 3D Twistor) you work with (i,j,k). We neither work with this presently or quite get the idea of those higher dimensions yet. It is "ball lightning" physics. We all know it exists and yet because we are unable to accept that the geometry is transcendental we get nowhere in analysing the physics. This stuff will play with your mind and it is very easy to "join the dots". It is a big jump though from conventional Physics into this realm.

Cheers
Good Elf
Hi Waterbreath,

You are right about the efficiency. It is not good using standard techniques. The real issue with electric power being transmitted through space is anyone can tap it for free. This is a bit of a downer for business. In the inductive field you can make a "hot spot" as an antinode. A tank circuit placed there will tap the power off "efficiently". This is not a good idea overall though. A lot of raw power "rippling" around your neighborhood keeping you "warm" in bed at night. That does not mean that Tesla was not a genius.

Big point here... Note that you are not transmitting photons so they are still "attached to the source". This means that provided that there are few dissipating elements in the neighborhood, all transmitted power is immediately returned to source regeneratively to be used again. This is unlike the standard transmitter where photons are launched freely as waves into space as packets never to return.

The unexpected benefit is that (aside from dissipation) the "radiator" is just topping up the power not continuously producing the full power. The field just oscellates in place inductively, back and forth. The same reason a magnet does not wind down after a while.

Cheers
Guest_philip347
Intresting thred.

Philnli
solidspin
GE -

- no pun intended! Very interesting. I was familiar w/ the cavity resonance being responsible for the string and the critical size, etc. I'm still really new to the details of ST, though.

I just got a book called "A first Course in String Theory" by Barton Zwieback @ MIT. Ring a bell? All the math is reasonably approachable, since I've had QM, solidstate physics, diff. eq. and multivar. calc. and the issue of dielectrics and plasmons is a fav. topic of mine from solid state, so I get that.

You must be referring to a lambda that's so large, however, it can resonate ambient electrons on less-than-perfectly conductive surfaces and take advantage of dielectrics on a multitude of surfaces such that they act as a mean w/ broad SDs, which nevertheless do not impede capacitance.

-ss
Good Elf
Hi Solidspin,

Sounds like an interesting book. It doesn't ring a bell though - I don't hail from there. Sounds like you could have a very interesting career ahead of you.

QUOTE (solidspin Posted on Aug 19 2005+ 06:48 PM)
You must be referring to a lambda that's so large, however, it can resonate ambient electrons on less-than-perfectly conductive surfaces and take advantage of dielectrics on a multitude of surfaces such that they act as a mean w/ broad SDs, which nevertheless do not impede capacitance.

You have been a little "terse" for me to follow. The discussion about Tesla is actually standard theory and I was not talking about String Theory. Obviously you could talk about the antenna as a D-Brane and photons as open strings attached to the same brane at either end then "launched" when the fields reverse as coupled electric and magnetic branes... he he he!!

That stringy stuff is possible to fold into Tesla's Ideas but he didn't use them (at least I do not know that he did). I wouldn't put it past him though, he was a Genius and didn't work theoretically but intuitively. He has given modern man almost every basic electronic technology we use today except computers and microcircuitry. In fact computers and microcircuitry is virtually all that has happened since... plus a lot of refinement. I was only referring to standard near-field theory available in most advanced texts on Electromagnetics. That is what Tesla was primarily involved with. I think if Tesla was born just a couple of years ago he would be building Starships by now. Alas all our heroes are ghosts. huh.gif

Cheers
Madkite
Thank you all for looking in to it. The longitudinal waves were only one part of the videos. I was also intrigued by the vacuum phenomenon. Why do the experimenters report a pushing effect from the vacuum bulb. I think the vacuum rectifies the current to produce a static charge on the glass so it attracts the copper but that would not explain the DC transmission effects shown later even if it explains the charging of the capacitor with the other end grounded an inch away from the glass. It should be noted that the capacitor charged better in some positions then others witch showed that the effect was being directed by the filament in some manner. With a purposely constructed bulb as Tesla had it could mean it is focusable in to a beam for transmission which explains some of the pictures on his patent (Apparatus for Utilization of Radiant Energy) in which fig4 shows a vacuum bulb with a curved disk at one end connected to the power souse and a plate receiver insulated by clear insulation connected to a capacitor to witch the other end is connected to ground. Tesla also talked about a phenomenon by witch the air was stimulated to brake down and conduct electricity and i don't mean sparks.

Just to finish i have a Crooks Radiometer (Also known as light windmill). It is a well known physics toy. If i sit it on top of by battery pulsed Tesla coil it illuminates the partial vacuum as expected and it dose not turn. But if it is held to one side it turns even though no visible or detectable light is being emitted (Though it doesn't mean their is not). Is the luminosity in the bulb casing the rotation as i wouldn't have thought that the radio waves being emitted would have caused it to turn. Whatever it is it is directional as otherwise it would turn when sat on top as well as to the side. I,m not a physicist so don't get too heavy on me. By the way the resonant frequency of the coil was about 0.5 meager Hurts and the voltage was about 15000. Would like to know what you think.
Good Elf
Hi Madkite,

I can't really say exactly what you are observing. I have never seen the videos or the particular apparatus you are speaking about. Sometimes you really need to see "stuff" to make some sensible comment. I think this is one of those cases. For instance you say..."fig4 shows a vacuum bulb with a curved disk at one end connected to the power souse and a plate receiver insulated by clear insulation connected to a capacitor to witch the other end is connected to ground. Tesla also talked about a phenomenon by witch the air was stimulated to brake down and conduct electricity and i don't mean sparks. "

It is no place to be "coy" if you want answers. My imagination is too broad to allow it to be open ended. Obviously ground plane resonances was one of Tesla's specialties but which one you are speaking about I cannot say since he had actually many thousands of patents... the guy was a "genius" and was one of the most productive of his kind ever. I have seen very graphic pictures of Tesla sitting in a room reading a newspaper with 50 ft sparks flashing around his head "harmlessly". I cannot grasp the full extent of these experiments without being there. It is like talking about a Shuttle Launch using the examples of the video or a still picture. The experience is not the same.

Sorry about that... Tesla was one of a kind.

In the case of the Crookes Radiometer. I used to own one of those things but it fell down and broke. Photons are emitted by any radio transmitter. In the case of a Tesla Coil it is a tank circuit and is an excellent example of a "bosonic field". The photons are not actually transmitted to distance they are a near field effect only. But inside that short range it will be subject to "torsions" and "resonances" in the near field. The field strength also varies very rapidly around that space. The effect you see is not that surprising. There would be action at points and rotating magnetic fields around that region as well as unbalanced charges. Good luck with it biggrin.gif and have fun.

Cheers
Madkite
Thanks Good elf.
If you want to look at the patent the number is 685,957 Date 1901
You could probably find it somewhere on the net and i think all us patent are listed on the net too. If you want another radiometer CAT sell them at £10 each which is very cheep. Hears the link http://www.cat.org.uk/index.tmpl?refer=index&init=1
Their not the best quality but there still very good.
Ron
Hey Good Elf,
I got intersted in your replies, so I went to google to search "string paradigm" and the very same post I read came up 2nd!
Just thought it was funny,
Ron
Good Elf
Hi Ron,

I guess what goes around comes around.... he he he! biggrin.gif I am probably one of the few idiots writing some of this stuff. The unfortunate thing is this does not mean anything other than what you are seeing... a great search engine but has no way to "sort" the information to make intelligent sense of it.

Try this search engine for Science stuff "only" and it might have some "smarts". That is not to put my stuff down but everyone should know that not everything is equally researched and peer reviewed that you find on the Web. wink.gif

SCIRUS search engine

I tried "string paradigm" there and got 63,000 science "hits".... some are quite good. But I put it in parenthesis and it reduced to only 35. This was not necessarily better as it would be in Google. There is an advance search facility. Some papers are very costly though.

Cheers
thezman
Hi,

From what I have read it seems that the longitudinal waves of Tesla were scalar electrostatic waves, rather than electromagnetic vector waves. Not sure though.

z
Madkite
I am sure they are not electromagnetic at all. He used the same technology to transmit high voltage DC so the voltage may be the important aspect in making the device work not the high frequency. Tesla coils are an ease way to produce a high enough voltage.
Zapper
I obtained the book version of the video and I thought it was interesting but only interesting... I need to test it to prove that the people are saying its true. I have made a high voltage 'tesla coil' but not Eric dollards 'tesla transformer' and am going to make the 'tesla transformer' after the HSc is finished. Sure the tesla coil is fascinating to watch but i kept wondering what good are they for apart from causing fluorescent tubes to light up?

cheers Zapper
Guest
"Interesting" facts:

1 - "Tesla coils" and "Tesla magifiers" are _not_ transformers, in the standard electrical sense; in reality, they are high-Q quarter-wave resonators. The "step-up ratio" is entirely dependent on impedance, and is not related to the physical "turns ratio" of the windings at all. An "Oudin coil" is exactly the same thing, only in this case, it is a half-wave resonator instead.

2 - Nikola Tesla eventually went completely insane; he died utterly broken and penniless. He was killed by American capitalists; they manipulated public opinion to the point where he was widely and constantly ridiculed in almost every manner. Traces of that ridicule survive to this very day - witness, for instance, the "Terry Tetzloff" character in the "Duckman" cartoon series.

3 - compared to Tesla, Edison was an _idiot_ - he couldn't even recognise the importance of the one true accidental discovery he did make; Fleming had to do that for him. And yet again; who do the Americans laud and revere to this very day?

Stupid, stupid, STUPID - what a colossal waste.
Zapper
Guest,
I was watching an interesting documentary on SBS (Australian television channel) and it was on the history of electricity. Thought they might mention Tesla.

Not at all! They went on and on and on and on about how edison, with his lightbulb 'lighted' up the world and that AC generation was the result of an improved DC dynamo... Also to make matters worse they mentioned that through his 'genius' he created many applications useful to us.
What a total waste of time and effort to create a documentary that is just plain gobblegook...
I was screaming out for the documentary to get off the screen and at least mention something about tesla. So i turned off the channel and read one of my books on Tesla.

To correct for the forum posted above - I know that tesla coils are high Q resonant coils after having built like 3 of them. Highly entertaining. So are tesla magnifiers. However i am convinced tesla was building them for a more beneficial reason so I am convinced that tesla discovered longitudinal waves through abrupt DC discharges. Its a long story but read this website at borderlands.com: http://www.borderlands.com/dollardandtesla.htm

If youre interested in reading more about the history and 'discovery' on tesla 'longitudinal waves' and how he discovered them, as mentioned by Dollard read this site:
http://www.borderlands.com/vassilatosandtesla.htm
Madkite
QUOTE
If youre interested in reading more about the history and 'discovery' on tesla 'longitudinal waves' and how he discovered them, as mentioned by Dollard read this site:
http://www.borderlands.com/vassilatosandtesla.htm



I have read that book. The first part about Tesla is most interesting. It is what I am trying to test currently. He believes the magnetic sparker gap among other devices that do the same job to be a crucial part in making the type of currents he described. I intend to construct one when I have the time and see if it makes any real difference.

Tesla did go a bit mad after he got hit by a taxi. But I cant hold that against him and he only started to make no sense when he was really old.
Stewie
QUOTE (Madkite+Oct 10 2005, 06:07 PM)
He believes the magnetic sparker gap among other devices that do the same job to be a crucial part in making the type of currents he described. I intend to construct one when I have the time and see if it makes any real difference.

I wonder... could it be due to the fact that a spark gap is essentially a negative resistance? I have built both vacuum-tube and solid-state types, and have basically produced naught but pretty sparks... but of course; they are indeed positive resistance components, and thus intrinsically different from a spark gap.

Interestingly; what 'Guest' said previously of Tesla apparatus being quarter-wave devices is correct; indeed, they do not even have to be coils at all - exactly the same effects can be produced with a low-loss narrow-bandwidth end-fed quarter-wave antenna wire... and (perhaps?) I might suspect, a quarter-wave waveguide resonator as well?

Well it's certainly great fun, at any rate! I wish you well in your research; please do let us know of the results, thanks.
Zapper
Stewie,

I have thought of a spark gap having a negative resistance compared to the copper wire that leads to the spark gap. Plasma is more conductive than metal in terms of electrical resistance to electrical current.

Despite this, the operation of a spark gap is crucial to manifesting these waves that Tesla was on about during some of his lectures. No, he was not on about Tesla coils (high frequency alternating resonance transformer) because they involve the movement of electrons in a wire, which he was trying to prevent from happening.
The spark gaps works to prevent electical current to flow in the wire, therefore causing a electrical longitudinal shockwave at the briefest moment the circuit is connected.

Cheers Zapper
Stewie
"The briefest moment..." hmm. That reminds me of a small 'experiment' I undertook, quite some years ago...

In the early Nineties, plasma displays were not yet common. I was curious about something; I wanted to see if a noble gas such as xenon or krypton could be excited to higher states of ionisation, by relatively 'ordinary' electronic means. The idea was to reproduce the primary colours within a single pixel cell, simply by varying the ionisation level.

Having no xenon or krypton lamps available to me that could be struck at relatively low voltages, I set about the attempt with a common NE-51 neon indicator lamp instead. The means of excitation was a 500-volt DC supply, gated through one of the 'high-voltage' power MOSFETS that were then available.

I succeeded in reaching the second level of neon ionisation, by hitting the lamp with 500-volt pulses of 60 ns duration, and the lamp dutifully glowed quite purple in response. However, much to my chagrin, it also succeeded in exciting the normal orange glow of first level ionisation as the second level decayed; therefore, I was never able to obtain a pure purple colour entirely.

Perhaps with a second MOSFET in the circuit, acting as a very fast quench?... who knows; I did not have the time, unfortunately, to pursue that avenue. And of course now, the point would be lost anyways...

Nevertheless; despite the (then) quite short pulse duration, I did not notice any unusual "longitudinal wave" effects - not that I was particularly looking for them in the first place, mind! The lamp simply glowed normal orange and bright purple, and that was that.

One interesting observation, though - I note that still, to this day, MOSFET manufacturers do not yet appreciate the enormous amount of _current_ that must be switched to the device's gate electrode, in order to obtain short full-output pulses at the drain! I was switching well in excess of 2 amps into the bloody thing, in order to get the pulse width down to 60 ns and of course, eventually the internal gate lead blew open... it simply was not designed adequately, to accept 60-watt pulses at the gate input. I wonder when they will begin to realise that, and eventually design devices with more robust gate construction? Or perhaps... possibly even better yet: dispense with the gate entirely, and use semiconductor lasers to switch a symmetrical bi-directional intrinsic channel directly? Imagine the revolution in industrial control electronics, when the device switching is completely freed of any electrical level references to the main electrodes! No more "high-side" drivers, or device 'polarity' issues... fantastic! I'd like to see that, someday.
Madkite
Will let you all know my results but it will be a while because of work. Not to mention all the other equipment I need to make like variable inductances. The old sort with the sliding brush on a wire coil. It saves ages of fiddling with the primary coil and it has been a nightmare insulating a variable capacitor. The sparks go straight through all the insulators I have tried and oil immersion seams the only option for that and that can make for a very messy awkward to store piece of equipment.

Thanks to you all for your input.
Zapper
QUOTE
MOSFET manufacturers do not yet appreciate the enormous amount of _current_ that must be switched to the device's gate electrode, in order to obtain short full-output pulses at the drain! I was switching well in excess of 2 amps into the bloody thing, in order to get the pulse width down to 60 ns and of course, eventually the internal gate lead blew open...


This could mean one thing - that 'longitudinal waves' could not be produced under these circumstances since the MOSFETs needed a certain amount of amps to switch on. In Tesla's version he never used MOSFETs or solid state devices since they didnt exist at the time he used homemade capacitors and a magnetic spark gap. Another thing about solid state devices - they are very inefficient in high power output requirements since they cannot handle such high voltage or high currents.


QUOTE (->
QUOTE
MOSFET manufacturers do not yet appreciate the enormous amount of _current_ that must be switched to the device's gate electrode, in order to obtain short full-output pulses at the drain! I was switching well in excess of 2 amps into the bloody thing, in order to get the pulse width down to 60 ns and of course, eventually the internal gate lead blew open...


This could mean one thing - that 'longitudinal waves' could not be produced under these circumstances since the MOSFETs needed a certain amount of amps to switch on. In Tesla's version he never used MOSFETs or solid state devices since they didnt exist at the time he used homemade capacitors and a magnetic spark gap. Another thing about solid state devices - they are very inefficient in high power output requirements since they cannot handle such high voltage or high currents.


the lamp dutifully glowed quite purple in response


could it be that there was a voltage spike at the beginning that was high enough to ionised neon to form a purple colour?


QUOTE
use semiconductor lasers to switch a symmetrical bi-directional intrinsic channel directly?


That would do a better job anyway... Not much i can say on this aspect of lasers since i dont know much about them... perhaps you could give me a link that explains the implications of using laser technology in place of solid state devices.


By the way I remember reading in one of Tesla's books in which Tesla said repeatedly that it was crucial to copy his electrical apparatus exactly (not in size but in proportions).


QUOTE (->
QUOTE
use semiconductor lasers to switch a symmetrical bi-directional intrinsic channel directly?


That would do a better job anyway... Not much i can say on this aspect of lasers since i dont know much about them... perhaps you could give me a link that explains the implications of using laser technology in place of solid state devices.


By the way I remember reading in one of Tesla's books in which Tesla said repeatedly that it was crucial to copy his electrical apparatus exactly (not in size but in proportions).


they do not even have to be coils at all - exactly the same effects can be produced with a low-loss narrow-bandwidth end-fed quarter-wave antenna wire... and (perhaps?) I might suspect, a quarter-wave waveguide resonator as well?


Hmmm.... there is a downside to this design - you would need an extremely very long antennae if you wanted it to be between MHz and Hz range. There is also another aspect to that design - it changes the 'Q' property of the resonator from a high Q to a low Q, thus have a very low self capacity - that means it would resonate to the vibrator or primary but would not manifest sparks because 99% of the energy stored would be in the form of hertzian radiation that would escape from the wire (radio waves).
Tesla modified his antenna to a coil so they could hold alot of energy for a certain amount of time and release it in one huge dump - the manifestation of electrical sparks often exceeding the height of the coil as well as a lot of radio waves.


QUOTE
the "Terry Tetzloff" character in the "Duckman" cartoon series.


Also the creator of frankenstein was copied after Tesla. Hint: lightning bolts from sky to a high metal tower connected to Frankenstein awaken him. 'Im aaaliiiive!"

Cheers Zapper wink.gif




Stewie
Oh my! This is all getting rather lengthy and involved, isn't it? Also; I do not yet have the 'Quoting' functions quite sorted out... please bear with me; I'll try as best I can.


Let's see... Madkite said:

"Will let you all know my results but it will be a while because of work.
Not to mention all the other equipment I need to make like variable
inductances. The old sort with the sliding brush on a wire coil. It
saves ages of fiddling with the primary coil and it has been a nightmare
insulating a variable capacitor. The sparks go straight through all the
insulators I have tried and oil immersion seams the only option for that
and that can make for a very messy awkward to store piece of equipment."


Well; perhaps, if I may be of some advice... have you given some consideration to the thought of using a variometer in the circuit, instead? Variometers are much simpler to construct than rotary-coil inductors, and they also enjoy the added benefit of being capable of handling much higher peak currents, as there is no longer any requirement for a sliding brush or rotary contact. True, the adjustment curve is not linear; it takes the shape of an 'S'-curve instead - however, in such a straightforward application, that should hardly prove to be a detriment.

Also; with regard to the variable capacitance - perhaps you should seek a good-quality vacuum capacitor, instead? The Jennings Radio Corporation used to manufacture these devices, for use as plate-tuning elements in the power amplifiers of large AM and SSB transmitters; they were quite robust, and often had ratings in the 30-40 kilovolt level. They were manufactured in both fixed and variable designs - I recall the variable units had to be driven with long fibre-phenolic shafts, so as to not present a lethal shock hazard to the transmitter operators!

Ah - here's a smaller one, on 'eBay':

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/JENNINGS-15-KV-VACUU...2QQcmdZViewItem


Now; then, Zapper said (and I fear I shall have to divide this response into several portions!):

"Quote: MOSFET manufacturers do not yet appreciate the enormous amount of
_current_ that must be switched to the device's gate electrode, in order
to obtain short full-output pulses at the drain! I was switching well in
excess of 2 amps into the bloody thing, in order to get the pulse width
down to 60 ns and of course, eventually the internal gate lead blew
open...

This could mean one thing - that 'longitudinal waves' could not be
produced under these circumstances since the MOSFETs needed a certain
amount of amps to switch on. In Tesla's version he never used MOSFETs or
solid state devices since they didnt exist at the time he used homemade
capacitors and a magnetic spark gap. Another thing about solid state
devices - they are very inefficient in high power output requirements
since they cannot handle such high voltage or high currents."


Well, I must admit I really do not know at all of the circumstances which may be required to produce "longitudinal" waves, as I am certainly far from being the sort of genius that Tesla was! My objective in that case was to produce the shortest possible pulse duration, obtainable only by designing the drive circuitry to produce the fastest possible switching times in the main circuit MOSFET... the 'fall' time, of course, being the most crucial, as, due to the Miller capacitance effect, a high-voltage MOSFET device becomes exceedingly difficult to turn _off_ rapidly. I was driving the gate with lower-voltage MOSFETS, and a +15-15 volt 10-amp bipolar power supply... and, it was the N-channel device connected to the -15 side that was passing the largest flow of current, by far. Incidentally; when I say a "60ns pulse" was obtained at the drain of the 500-volt device, that pulse width was measured at very nearly the ground level, not halfway up the slope. The best 'rise' time I obtained, as I recall, was something on the order of 16ns from ground to +500, and the 'fall' time was slightly more than 25ns.


"Quote: the lamp dutifully glowed quite purple in response

could it be that there was a voltage spike at the beginning that was
high enough to ionised neon to form a purple colour?"


Yes; that was the idea, of course. You see, when such a lamp is operated "normally", the first-level ionisation establishes a voltage drop of about 90 volts between the electrodes, and this drop is quite independent of the lamp current - the current may be increased or decreased over a fairly significant range, yet the 90-volt drop will remain constant - this, in fact, was the operating principle behind the "VR" voltage regulator tubes that were formerly employed to maintain stable screen and plate voltages throughout the era of vacuum-tube radio, long before the solid-state Zener diode regulators came about.

However; in measuring the drop across the lamp in my circuit, I was pleasantly surprised to observe that the 'standard' first-level voltage drop was being bypassed entirely! I employed a good-quality oscilloscope for the measurement, with a rather expensive 'fast-response' low-capacity high-voltage measurement probe, and although I had expected to see at least some sort of a "bump" in the waveform at the usual 90-volt level, there was indeed no such "bump" whatsoever - the voltage rose smoothly all the way up to 500 volts, directly across the lamp electrodes! My guess at the time was that perhaps the pulse duration was so brief that the gas really may not have had sufficient time to enter fully into either first-level or second-level ionisation... which (if I may be allowed to digress somewhat?) brings to mind another interesting point about spark-gaps in general: because they depend on ionisation for conductance, they are relatively 'slow' devices, with switching speeds generally measured in milliseconds (although the thyratron gas tubes employed in radar pulse work did get down into the range of several microseconds, because they utilised hydrogen - the lightest gas, having, of course, the most mobile of ions.). And this also restricts the operating range of "traditional" Tesla devices to the lower frequencies only - it is not the principle, but rather the means of switching the current that becomes the problem, in attempting to raise the operating frequency (and thus reduce the size of the device.).


"Quote: use semiconductor lasers to switch a symmetrical bi-directional
intrinsic channel directly?

That would do a better job anyway... Not much i can say on this aspect
of lasers since i dont know much about them... perhaps you could give me
a link that explains the implications of using laser technology in place
of solid state devices."


No, unfortunately I cannot, as that technology does not yet exist - it is merely a thought I've had, for some time; the notion that perhaps instead of using a metal or polysilicon 'gate' electrode to induce conductance in the main silicon channel of a FET device, the electric field of the photons produced by a semiconductor laser (in the same package, much as in the case of an optoisolator, and shone directly at the main channel) could be employed to induce the conductance directly.

However, there is at least one reference that comes to mind of lasers being used to trigger conductance in _ionisation_ ("spark-gap") channels directly, and that would be this one:

http://www.sandia.gov/media/images/jpg/Z.jpg

Oh - sorry; that's the picture (an old link I had, laying about)... this is the reference:

http://www.sandia.gov/media/z290.htm


"By the way I remember reading in one of Tesla's books in which Tesla
said repeatedly that it was crucial to copy his electrical apparatus
exactly (not in size but in proportions)."


This was likely because the Q of a resonant circuit inductive element is determined, I believe, by the ratio of instantaneous AC impedance to the intrinsic DC ohmic resistance. In other words, in order to obtain a high value of Q in a coil, the wire must have the _lowest_ ohmic resistance possible - and thus, be quite *thick* of gauge.

The first "Tesla coil project" I attempted was when I was rather young; it was an article that appeared in the magasine 'Popular Electronics', sometime during the 1960's. The design employed a far-too-long secondary coil that consisted of very _fine_ gauge wire that was close-wound on a waxed cardboard tube, and driven by an 811A transmitting tube in, I believe, a Hartley oscillator circuit driving the primary. It was far too low in Q to be efficient, and the results were not very spectacular. I believe the author may have been labouring under the (incorrect) impression that a "Tesla coil" should be acting as an electrical transformer, perhaps? Tesla, on the other hand, used heavy-gauge spaced-wound wire on large-diameter open wooden frames - and of course, obtained much more satisfactory results.


"Quote: they do not even have to be coils at all - exactly the same effects
can be produced with a low-loss narrow-bandwidth end-fed quarter-wave
antenna wire... and (perhaps?) I might suspect, a quarter-wave waveguide
resonator as well?

Hmmm.... there is a downside to this design - you would need an
extremely very long antennae if you wanted it to be between MHz and Hz
range. There is also another aspect to that design - it changes the 'Q'
property of the resonator from a high Q to a low Q, thus have a very low
self capacity - that means it would resonate to the vibrator or primary
but would not manifest sparks because 99% of the energy stored would be
in the form of hertzian radiation that would escape from the wire (radio
waves)."


It is indeed difficult to obtain a high value of "Q" in a longwire quarter-wave antenna, primarily because the conditions for such are quite contrary - in order to achieve the narrowest bandwidth (and thus the greatest amount of resonance, the "equivalent" of Q) in such an antenna, the aspect ratio (of length to wire diameter) must be as large as possible. In other words, this results in a very fine wire gauge along a rather long length - with consequently high ohmic losses.

Nevertheless, a fairly decent compromise may indeed be obtained - and it is a well-known fact that the 'open' end of a quarter-wave antenna will develop a _much_ higher voltage than the 'driven' end, due to _impedance transformation_... and impedance transformation, of course, is exactly what a Tesla resonator is all about.

I seem to recall reading once somewhere, that during the very early days of trans-oceanic underseas cable telecommunications, the keying rate of the Morse code sequences had to be closely watched and regulated, lest the voltage at the receiving end be built up to such an extent that the receiving station apparatus may arc over disastrously, and be burnt-out!


"Tesla modified his antenna to a coil so they could hold alot of energy
for a certain amount of time and release it in one huge dump - the
manifestation of electrical sparks often exceeding the height of the
coil as well as a lot of radio waves."


Well; the "certain amount of time" would, of course, be one-fourth of the full cycle of the resonant frequency - the direct physical analogy would be akin to cracking a whip. And the "amount" of energy stored in a coil is directly proportional to the physical size of its construction.


"Quote: the "Terry Tetzloff" character in the "Duckman" cartoon series."

Hmm? I'm sorry; did I say that? I don't seem to recall... oh; no, I see by scrolling, that it was that "Guest" fellow... I'm afraid I don't quite understand this; could someone please tell me what it's about? I've not yet had an opportunity to view that particular 'cartoon series'.


"Also the creator of frankenstein was copied after Tesla. Hint: lightning
bolts from sky to a high metal tower connected to Frankenstein awaken
him. 'Im aaaliiiive!""


Oh, no! You've got it quite reversed, I'm afraid - you see, it was _Frankenstein_ that was the creator... whereas his creation, according to the author, was not bestowed with any name; it was simply referred to by the popular press in those days as "Frankenstein's monster".

I'm not quite certain, but did Mary Shelley not precede Nikola Tesla by a generation? I'm not sure they were contemporary...

Oh well! This is all so very interesting... I do hope these discussions may assist with your experiments in some way. They are certainly fascinating, at any rate, and I wish you both success!

Best regards towards all -
Zapper
Hey Stewie,
thanks for that interesting response - I didnt know that the story of frankenstein predated Tesla by nearly half a century! In resonse to your question, Mary Shelley wrote the story of Frankenstein in 1831.


Yeah about longitudinal wave research its quite simple to understand if you view it as an 'electrical sound wave' Ill tell you a bit about the history of how tesla came across that new discovery for the first time.

During the beginning of the last century Edison was organising the electrical power grid system that was operated by DC generators which seem primitive to AC generators that we have nowdays. Because there was no transformation of voltage and current along the wire, power losses were extreme and people could only use DC if they were within a mile of the generator.

The interesting thing happens here. When the DC generator was running, immediately after connecting it to powerlines, a strange manifestation appeared along the lines and radiated out in all directions, seeking for a ground, which it did if a person came too close to it, usually killing him or her in the process. That manifestation disappeared as soon as electrons started flowing through the wire. (That means it only appeared for the briefest moment when the generator connected to the power lines. Electrons stifled that manifestation.)
Electrical engineers at the time were trying to quench that manifestation as it was a nuisance (in their perspective), which they suceeded in doing so. Tesla, however saw it as a new form of energy manifesting outwards from the wire.

This is what led to tesla discovering his so called 'electrical longitudinal waves'.


Anyway its an interesting story - you should read it.
http://www.borderlands.com/vassilatosandtesla.htm

Thanks for your response. Zapper wink.gif
Madkite
Thanks Stewie. All advice is appreciated. I haven't tried some of he other methods Tesla used for tuning yet. A simple coil on a tube with a sliding iron core was one of the easy ones to build but I decided that it was not as versatile because you can near enough bypass the coil in the sliding brush kind. Its half constructed now so I will keep with it but I will keep the information on board for future projects.
Good Elf
Hi All,

For want of understanding I put this "apocryphal" reference here about Tesla. I have no idea what it really means.. Interesting though.
The Complete Patents of Nikola Tesla
The reference goes on about his Magnifying Transmitter and "white fire"???
QUOTE (White-fire+)
The fact that white-fire discharges pass through all matter, notably insula­tors, revealed the Aetheric nature. Tesla saw that white-fire discharges could permeate all materials in a strangely gaseous manner. This penetration scarcely heated matter. In fact, the white-fire brushes often had a cooling effect. The sparks themselves, though violent in appearance, were "soft" when com­pared to all other forms of electricity. He had successfully removed the haz­ard from electricity. In blocking the slow and dense charges, he had freed the mysterious effusive Aether streams inherent in electricity. Because of this, new and intensified radiant effects were constantly making their appearance across his laboratory space.


Cheers
Stewie
Following a period of some illness, I have at last managed to refer to the link that Good Elf has most kindly provided. In this reading, I begin to see a hint, I believe, of the direction that Zapper may be attempting to follow?

Towards which I would now submit this addendum: Zapper; if this direction is indeed your pursuit, perhaps you would be best off to seek to obtain your apparatus components from surplus radar equipments, in particular. I say this because radar devices are specifically designed towards one purpose of notable import to your researches: that purpose being, of course, the deliverance of very high amounts of impulse power. Consider; while the average 'obsolete' vacuum-tube X-band marine radar transmitter power supply unit was of itself capable of delivering only several hundred watts of _continuous_ power, typically, that power deliverance was nonetheless shaped and delivered _impulsively_ into the actual magnetron transmitter portion, to result in the final deliverance of power at the antenna output of microwave impulses approaching a _quarter-megawatt_ intensity! Does this type of apparatus not seem more suitable to your research requirements?

Regarding now the link text: I cannot help but to find myself wondering if Mr. Tesla did indeed discover microwaves! The descriptions provided allude to the very nature of that form of electromagnetic radiation: in particular, the manner in which it flowed right around his solid-copper grounded Faraday cages; the "white fire" observed surrounding other metallic objects; the physiological sensation of warmth; the 'peculiar' penetrating quality... all and more are highly and truly characteristic of microwave energy.

In support of this thought, I do take some exception towards Mr. Tesla's assertion that there was "no inductance" present in the circuit. For what was completely unrecognised in his time, but is certainly very well-known now, is the simple fact that _any_ length of conductor bears an amount of inductance - indeed; even to the molecular dimensions of a carbon nanowire. Consider, for instance, the now well-known difficulties presented in fabricating connections to modern microwave-speed integrated circuitry, where the inductance present in even a single millimetre's length of die-bond connection wire may impose severe clock-phasing and signal-delay limitations.

I submit that the connection leads between Mr. Tesla's capacitor and spark-gap comprised a transmission-line form of resonator - and in further actuality; even the very spark itself - its dimension too would surely emanate a microwave resonance. The apparatus toto would surely emit, in all likelihood, a rather high energy level of combined RF: microwaves from the spark-gap; VHF or UHF from the capacitor leads; HF from the dynamo connections.

No wonder then, that Tesla patented diathermy! ;-)
Madkite
He said he had made what he called millimeter rays long before anyone else and he took x-rays that were nearly as good as modern hospital ones some 40 feet away from his equipment. He was also the first to warn of the dangers of radiation. All of this in the 1890's. Long before anyone else had a much idea. Maybe they were microwaves but I think he would have deduced that given all the types of emissions he had identified.
Stewie
Truly, Madkite, this is quite fascinating! I must admit, I was completely unaware of such, and further; I did not see any mentions of it within the webpage referred to by the link that Good Elf has supplied... indeed, I was left with an impression quite to the contrary; it seemed almost as though Mr. Tesla considered the "new form of electricity" to be most safe, and perfectly harmless.

My impression of those 'early days' is rather limited, however - as aged as I am presently, I am nevertheless surely not of that era! ;-)

From what I had gathered during my readings as a youth, I was quite left with the impression that the shorter wavelengths were completely unknown; and that emanations such as microwaves would have then been wholly unimaginable.

Consider the history of the founding of the Amateur Radio Relay League in 1914, for example: in that year, Hiram Percy Maxim - after much political badgering! - at last succeeded in obtaining the first official licensing procedures for "amateur" radio operators... conditional, however, upon the stringent stipulation that such class of radio operations be strictly limited to "200 metres and below" - those wavelengths being then chosen because the engineering concensus of the time considered them to be utterly _useless_ for radio communications of any practical distance! Would not "sub-millimetre waves" most surely have been scoffed at then, and dismissed entirely as "scientifictional" or outright fantasy?

Even the first 'publicised' voice 'broadcast', in 1906, was radiated at a frequency of only 60KHz:

http://www.radiocom.net/Fessenden

There is a great amount of difficulty, I think, in regard to intrepretations of language. Many of the engineering terms in use a century ago have long-since fallen into disuse; many have perhaps changed in meaning, or have been forgotten completely. I wonder what the precise wording of your reference is... would it be perhaps possible, if you may please, to provide a reference link towards the statement of "sub-millimetre waves"? It may be interesting to myself, to see if I can grasp the context somewhat... and to verify if they were, in fact, in Tesla's own words.

Thank-you!
Madkite
Unfortunately Web links on such may be hard if not impossible to find. But I can refer you to various books. Most of the material may be copyrighted so that is why it is probably not on the web. http://www.tfcbooks.com/default.htm You can get most of the books from here. Tesla Said, Nikola Tesla Collected Articles and Lectures Volume 1and 2, The Inventions Researches and writings of Nikola Tesla, are a few good ones as well as Tesla Master of Lightning for good pictures. I can't remember which book I read it in now and don't have the time at the moment to look it up right away. Sorry about this but it is surprisingly hard to find his articles on the net.

I agree about language though. Most people Don't realize the Roentgen ray's are X-rays and both terms are readily used in one article sometimes. Often in a way that makes them sound as though they are two different things. Tesla was also deliberately cautious about what he said after about 1894 which is why his lectures he gave between 1891 and 1894 are so nice as they are extremely through.

Sorry but the only way to get half this stuff is to pay.
Guest
Hello, Madkite! Yes; I quite agree - I have come across a few such books in the past, and at that time, had noted that by far the ones which possessed the greatest detail were written in languages I cannot read. It was most frustrating - however; equally frustrating is my inability to purchase many books, for their prices are most often well beyond my exceedingly modest means... plus an additional complication in the fact that I have no ability to purchase any items online anyway.

Oh well. Perhaps I may journey a bit on the weekends, weather permitting, and attempt to peruse the libraries once again.

For this moment, however, I shall remain faithfully adhered to this PhysOrg website - and note with much amusement the following:

http://www.physorg.com/news7751.html

Imagine the chagrin of that hapless researcher, if he should at last learn that his "discovery" has indeed been known for more than a century! Perhaps he may be nominated as a possible candidate for next year's IgNobels? :-))
Stewie
Oh, good heavens! How silly of me... I really should endeavour to wake up more fully prior to posting a message - of course, the foregoing was written by me - Stewie.
Madkite
It amazes me they were surprised by this. After all as any object is heated it gives off increasingly hire frequency electro magnetic emissions. Red hot objects turn white as you continue to heat. If you could keep on heating an object without it melting why would you not obtain gamma rays. A spark is intensely hot. Lightning is supposed to be far hotter than the sun. Why would it not emit high frequency radiation. Seemed obvious to me. Tesla melted diamonds in his vacuum bulbs when he was looking for the ideal material for the button from which the light emitted. Interesting, he tried a wide variety of materials to try and obtain one that would survive. He settled on a carbon button which is obviously a conductor but diamond! He did not say it had to be a conductor, nor did he say it was inhibited by being an insulator. Weird.
Stewie
I must admit, Madkite, that I too am astounded - I fully believed that _every_ electrical experimenter/hobbyist would surely know that a high-voltage arc does generate X-rays! Right along with the fact that the voltage does _not_ need to attain levels of several megavolts; indeed, anything over 30KV will suffice - I know that to be true, as I have performed the same experiment myself.

As a youth, one of my most prized possessions was an antique automotive spark coil of the 'vibrator' type - it was capable of generating voltages to about 40KV. I was also interested in photography then, and had the necessary materials and means at hand. I wrapped a small piece of high-speed black-and-white photographic film in some of the thick black protective paper packaging material that print paper was usually packaged in, and ensured there was no light leakage. Then I placed a pair of copper wires slightly above it, spaced them a couple of centimetres distance from each other, connected them to the spark coil and operated it for several minutes. When the film was subsequently developed, it showed the black trace of the arc clearly - although the protective paper had not been damaged in any manner.

It seems rather sad, doesn't it? That so many children of this modern era apparently possess so little curiosity that they no longer pay any attention to even the simplest such 'experiments' of scientific nature. Alas; for I can only shake my head, and... continue to wonder.
Zapper
QUOTE
He settled on a carbon button which is obviously a conductor but diamond! He did not say it had to be a conductor, nor did he say it was inhibited by being an insulator


Maybe that matter could be cleared up if you got a book called "The fantastic inventions of Nikola Tesla" by Nikola Tesla and David H. Childress. Ive read about that matter concerning diamond and it is said from the excerpt from page 114 - 115 in the book: "when the frequencies become excessive [very high frequency, greater than 60cycles per second or cps], the role of the conductor [with reference to material in light bulbs, whether it is tungsten, diamond, carbon, or glass] may be come quite insignificant. In the latter case the dfference of potential at the terminals of the condenser may become so great as to rupture the dielectric, notwithstanding the fact that the terminals are joined by a conductor of low resistance...even a perfect non-conductor may quite be readily heated..."

He also states in that book: "What is likely to be the light of the future? Is it to be an incandescent solid, as in the present lamp, or an incandescent gas, or a phosphorescent body or something like a burner, but incomparably more efficient?"

We still are stuck on the incandescent light bulb!!

I cant really make a phosphorescent bulb because I havent got the specific equipment required to make one. Vacuum pump, glass blower, propane gas burner, diamond crystal, glass sealant, etcetera...

QUOTE (->
QUOTE
He settled on a carbon button which is obviously a conductor but diamond! He did not say it had to be a conductor, nor did he say it was inhibited by being an insulator


Maybe that matter could be cleared up if you got a book called "The fantastic inventions of Nikola Tesla" by Nikola Tesla and David H. Childress. Ive read about that matter concerning diamond and it is said from the excerpt from page 114 - 115 in the book: "when the frequencies become excessive [very high frequency, greater than 60cycles per second or cps], the role of the conductor [with reference to material in light bulbs, whether it is tungsten, diamond, carbon, or glass] may be come quite insignificant. In the latter case the dfference of potential at the terminals of the condenser may become so great as to rupture the dielectric, notwithstanding the fact that the terminals are joined by a conductor of low resistance...even a perfect non-conductor may quite be readily heated..."

He also states in that book: "What is likely to be the light of the future? Is it to be an incandescent solid, as in the present lamp, or an incandescent gas, or a phosphorescent body or something like a burner, but incomparably more efficient?"

We still are stuck on the incandescent light bulb!!

I cant really make a phosphorescent bulb because I havent got the specific equipment required to make one. Vacuum pump, glass blower, propane gas burner, diamond crystal, glass sealant, etcetera...

surely know that a high-voltage arc does generate X-rays!
Then I was wrong in that regard for i thought x-rays could only be produced via high voltage and high frequency electricity.

QUOTE
It seems rather sad, doesn't it? That so many children of this modern era apparently possess so little curiosity that they no longer pay any attention to even the simplest such 'experiments' of scientific nature.
For example, children are not interested in simple wonders because the simple wonders are everyday stuff. Consider the tv screen they see every day - when i was a kid I never watched TV very much. Kids nowdays have this mentality that the answers given to them on a silver platter.

Cheers Zapper!
Madkite
The TV truly rots the mind's of everyone. As a kid of 4 I played with batteries and bulbs,motors and generally messed about with stuff. I spent hours making model plains (The rubber powered kind that break very easily) And made a double acting steam engine at 9. I have always gone to the more practical side of things when it comes to science or anything else. Unfortunately I am no scholar though. Was awful at English and languages. Still am tongue.gif
Good Elf
Hi All,

Just like to say that Tesla was indeed a genius. But he was very secretive and unusual. We all know about the invention of poly-phase power generation and distribution. without that... modern society would not be able to function. He also invented fluorescent lighting... got to be far more efficient than incandescent bulbs. What is less well known is his work on resonant circuits. He built "boats" which were remotely controlled and steered using transmitted power and controls based on tuned circuits way before the turn of the last century. Tesla was the "father" of "Robotics". Less well known is that all this "stuff" actually was based on spark gap resonators. These would be in the microwave region of transmission. It truly amazed me that he lived so long with all that exposure to high levels of such radiation... yet he did. I look at some of of the circuits for these "mechanical" devices and I am baffled as to how some of these things worked... yet they did. He seemed to be "channeling" wisdom from the future.

The strange thing was he nearly won the Nobel Prize alongside Einstein. Tesla never believed in Einstein and his famous Theories. He... I believe he was misguided. Tesla said that there was no energy in matter. In one way he may have been in some way right but he missed the idea of binding energy in matter. Tesla could not understand that his "vision" may have been compatible with Einstein's "in some way" but rather than accept that it was "something new", he preferred to be confrontational in all discussions about him. That is the reason why Tesla never won the Nobel Prize in the end, if anyone should have... it should have been him for the great legacy he bequeathed mankind. One thinks what might have happened if the two Genius's had seen eye to eye. Tesla was Engineering Physicist and Einstein simply used a pencil and his mind. Einstein was no maths genius but he "got along" quite well. Today it is the quietly spoken Einstein not the flamboyant Tesla that Scientists identify with. Perhaps it is well to be of a more even temper than eccentric... Still if I was to weigh them both up "dispassionately" I think Tesla was the "real Genius" in the classic sense. I hope the future credits the man with more than he has been so far and how an ungrateful Society left him to die alone... and in poverty.

Cheers
Madkite
Their was a more fundamental reason he disagreed. He believed that all radioactive mater received it's energy from cosmic rays (What he called cosmic rays) and because of it's peculiar makeup transformed it in to radiation. He also claimed by using his vacuum bulb you could make radioactive material from inert material. He said it was not a theory, he had actually done it in experiments and radium could be produced cheaply, $1 a pound. (One dollar in the early part of the century that is) He said copper and Lead (I think) after many many years exposed to the sun became radioactive. Old lead and copper from roofs according to this should be radioactive. Ever herd of this.

By the way he also said the tube needed exceedingly high potential and a special construction. His tube according to him could withstand 50,000,000 Volts!!!
Zapper
QUOTE
he had made what he called millimeter rays


It is also not very well known that Tesla indeed founded the principle for radar tracking systems as found on this website: http://www.unmuseum.org/tesla2.htm

"Dr. Emil Girardeau lead an effort to build and install the first French radar systems, he credited Tesla, saying the equipment was "precisely apparatuses conceived according to the principles stated by Tesla."

QUOTE (->
QUOTE
he had made what he called millimeter rays


It is also not very well known that Tesla indeed founded the principle for radar tracking systems as found on this website: http://www.unmuseum.org/tesla2.htm

"Dr. Emil Girardeau lead an effort to build and install the first French radar systems, he credited Tesla, saying the equipment was "precisely apparatuses conceived according to the principles stated by Tesla."

He also claimed by using his vacuum bulb you could make radioactive material from inert material.
If that bulb was designed and used nowdays then it would cause an uproar in the scientific community as it conflicts with Einsteins theory of nuclear energy and fusion principles...
Madkite
I have a vague idea of how this bulb is to work. The bulb needs to be operated approximately at 1000000 volts+. According to Tesla particles are ejected from the electrode and they cray some of the charge with them. Electrostatic forces then repel the particle at incredible speed with the charge. He may have believed this particle to be what made up the either. The bulbs in some patents has a conical aluminum disk at one end and it is in a sausage shaped glass. (Sorry for the bad description) The distinctive thing is the large volume given to have seemingly no purpose but it could be to help accelerate the particles. I think the trouble would be insulating it as Tesla speaks of slowly progressing the design to withstand the high potential. Sadly their is no released drawings of the finished design but it did seem to exist.
Good Elf
Hi Madkite,

I don't know about Tesla but Nuclear Fusion in your pocket is possible with a tiny high voltage device see this reference ...
Cold Fusion is back.... hot fusion in your pocket
Maybe this was what he was on about. I have seen schematics and it is constructible and Tesla could have done it. It surely creates significant Neutron Radiation and it may have led him to the "wrong conclusions". It "sure is a real pretty thing though"... "picture is cool".

A couple of posts down from there (see extrasense) you see an actual circuit design that they used to do this and for all you might know it may have come straight from Tesla... wink.gif Some of the actual developers have "chipped in" on the thread to discuss this device... it is a fascinating story and a good read.

But this is not to take away from the guys (and gals) who developed this "toy". We are always "re-inventing" stuff. Very little is actually new in the world and the same "motifs" crop up time and time again. Even that topic of "Cold Fusion"... it first started before World War II.... a long story. Everything "old" is new again.

Pretty "hot" fusion picture... way cool
user posted image
Don't do this at home "kids". biggrin.gif

Cheers
Stewie
Hmm... an interesting concept, Good Elf - a pyroelectric crystal fusion device, indeed! I wonder... do you think any further improvement on this device may be possible, so that it may perhaps attain 'break-even' efficiency? So many have attempted throughout the long years and decades, yet attaining such efficiency remains a seemingly-insurmountable problem. I am reminded, for example, of Philo T. Farnsworth's patented "Fusor" device:

http://farnovision.com/chronicles/fusion/index.html

Which, being electrical in nature, appeared relatively straightforward and promising at the time... yet also failed to reach 'break-even' efficiency.

It is a rather frustrating situation, is it not? Practical fusion has for so long seemed "just around the corner..." Oh well. I remain hopeful that perhaps one day soon we may yet succeed!

This view of Tesla's towards radioactivity also puts me in mind of something... Good Elf; is it not possible to generate a source of neutrons by purely electrical means? I seem to recall reading once of such a concept; some fairly simple sort of electrical apparatus that could be employed as a laboratory source of neutrons... I do not recall the principle, unfortunately. Would you be able to assist my memory, if you please? I am wondering if this concept could be somewhat towards the idea that Tesla was attempting to communicate.

Or perhaps more likely, I am misunderstanding his thinking completely. It seems so strange; that aspect of Tesla apparently believing that there could be "no energy in matter"... I find great difficulty in comprehending that, for to me it seems quite the opposite - that "matter" is simply an illusion, and that _all_ is comprised of fields of energy. That concept seems far more intuitive and comprehensible to me, but of course I am hardly expert in such thinking.

Now; Zapper - as an electronics technician, I may indeed assure you that the production of 'soft' X-rays by certain types of electronic equipments has long been recognised, and regarded as a serious health and safety issue. Consider, for example, the repair of cathode-ray tube types of computer displays and television receiver sets; should one read within the repair manuals, one encounters a number of warnings regarding the proper adjustment of the level of high voltage developed - warnings concerning the excess production of X-rays, should the maximum permissible adjustment level be exceeded. There may often be additional warning stickers applied to the tube itself, and indeed, one will note that the faceplate of the tube is always constructed of thick and _heavily-leaded_ glass - this being one of the main reasons behind the great concerns expressed by various regulatory and environmental agencies presently, as the lead content of the CRT faceplate, the plastic casing materials, the wire insulation coatings, and the solder employed in fabrication are all considered to be highly hazardous. The lead content of the glass CRT faceplate, however, comprises the greatest portion of the disposed waste - and that lead is present in that glass due to public safety concerns towards the production of X-rays; it is not required for structural integrity.

Interestingly, and aside from all that, glass poses another difficulty with X-rays - there exists a problem of discolouration! I was advised once by a CRT manufacturer that the type of tubes employed for projection use are more expensive and difficult of construction because the faceplate must be fabricated of a special "anti-browning" type of glass that is somewhat more difficult to work with. This is because at accelerating voltage levels in excess of 40KV, ordinary faceplate-glass will become brown due to the degrading influence of the X-rays - and a projection CRT is operated at levels of 60KV, and greater; the 'skiatron' type (with phosphor type P10) being the sole exception that I am aware of.

http://www.probertencyclopaedia.com/SS.HTM

Within my experience, I have also not encountered even a single instance of any X-ray tube being operated with alternating current, high-frequency or otherwise - they are always operated with DC, at levels ranging from as low as 6KV in some X-ray fluorescence applications, to 150KV and beyond, in medical X-ray apparatus.

I have also been involved with electron microscopy. One of the capabilities of a typical scanning electron microscope is elemental analysis, and this is also due to X-ray fluorescence - the principle being that a beam of electrons impinging upon a target will excite the atoms of the elements within the target, and they will subsequently emit their characteristic X-ray spectra, which is then detected and analysed. Here is a link which may assist in further explanation:

http://www.thermo.com/com/CDA/Category/Cat...213,503,00.html

Well! Madkite, I too find Mr. Tesla's light bulbs to be quite fascinating - although I have never been able to understand their principle of operation. I am aware of the corona effect, yet I fail to grasp how that alone could account for such a lamp to have an amount of brilliance sufficient for the purpose of illumination! And yet, his lamps had but a single electrode - how could there be electrical conduction, other than through capacitance towards the atmosphere? And would the light output then not vary, as the capacitance also varies due to both altitude and percentage of atmospheric moisture? Unless, perhaps, the lamps were intended to be operated within the confines of a grounded luminaire... I must admit my own knowledge to be sadly deficient in this matter. As I remarked to Good Elf earlier, Tesla's thinking is certainly difficult to follow!

Yet perhaps... through the kind assistances and observations of yourselves, the participants in this forum topic... perhaps I may eventually arrive at some small degree of understanding?

One may always hope! ;-)
Madkite
One must not confuse Tesla light bulb with his other type to project invisible rays for power. The light bulb in Tesla's own words becomes luminescent because their are still particles in the evacuated bulb and when the current is applied they are attracted and repelled with great speed. They the act like millions of tiny hammers are pounding the button in to incandescence. But he also said that the higher the vacuum the hotter the button becomes. It may me because of less loss to the atmosphere through the capacitance of the bulb.

While I imagine the other type of bulb glowed it was not something desired I think. But then I have never read a report of one of these bulbs working.

Stewie if you PM me your e-mail address I have some stuff in PDF format (Needs acrobat reader) you could have. Will try to find some more like this if you wish.
Stewie
Good Elf; everyone - I do realise that this is not on-topic; however, it is certainly most interesting... I would wish to post the link here, as I am yet rather unfamiliar with the process of initiating a new topic separately:

http://www.opensourceenergy.org/txtlstvw.a...02-a69aca481e6a

Cheers!
Good Elf
Hi Stewie,

QUOTE (Stewie Posted on Nov 6 2005+ 05:50 PM)
I am yet rather unfamiliar with the process of initiating a new topic separately:

No problem about a new topic. You just go to the forum category you feel most closely matches your new thread and just click the New Topic Button (right next to the add reply button).

Cheers
herbo21k
Mr madkite would you please take some time learning to spell? Typos and haste create errors that are maybe understandable but your input is really deficient. Don't you know the difference between witch and which? Using the spell check feature supplied to you free of charge will help you communicate. Yo, dude, it's important!
Madkite
QUOTE
Mr madkite would you please take some time learning to spell? Typos and haste create errors that are maybe understandable but your input is really deficient. Don't you know the difference between witch and which? Using the spell check feature supplied to you free of charge will help you communicate. Yo, dude, it's important!


I apologies but language is just one of those things that I a awful at. I really drove all my English teachers nuts and it is not as if I didn't make an effort. sad.gif I have just had to accept that I have no talent in this aria, in fact I have quite the opposite and struggle quite badly. Please accept by apologies but it is not something I think will ever improve. It is like playing an instrument, some can and some just can't.
esaruoho
QUOTE (Madkite+Aug 10 2005, 10:23 PM)
Have you seen Eric Dolards videos you can get at http://www.borderlands.com/
He claims to create a longitudinal electric wave that travels faster than light. The videos also show up weird vacume penomenom when an odenery vacume light bumb is stimulated by a Tesla coil. Some of these findings verify Tesla's clames that he cold transmit power withought wires!! It shoulb be realised before anyone say's that you cant transmit power with convetional radio waves Tesla never intended to use them.

im very happy to say that both of the eric dollard transverse + longitudinal electricity videos have popped up on googlevideo! they are pretty low quality (transfers from NTSCVHS, with tracking issues), but the information is still there.

these, coupled in with the two meyl longitudinal scalar wave (wireless) transmissions on googlevideo are gems.

it would be great to spark up a conversation regarding this and the september 11th, 1932 article written by tesla, where he describes how the longitudinal pulses travel, and in what they travel - and what they resemble.

esaruoho
QUOTE (Zapper+Oct 6 2005, 11:01 PM)
I obtained the book version of the video and I thought it was interesting but only interesting... I need to test it to prove that the people are saying its true. I have made a high voltage 'tesla coil' but not Eric dollards 'tesla transformer' and am going to make the 'tesla transformer' after the HSc is finished. Sure the tesla coil is fascinating to watch but i kept wondering what good are they for apart from causing fluorescent tubes to light up?

cheers Zapper

it is rumoured that the two dollard videos, the build in "tesla longitudinal energy" is based on the colorado springs notes page 14 (or 15?). hope this helps. they built it out of scrap.

what tesla coils are for is a very interesting question. what do you think they are for? tesla was not a circus performer, or trying to woo the ladies. it would appear that he wanted to achieve increasingly high frequencies -- to do what?
did he build the tesla coil as a tool to understand magnetism?
what led him to this?

p.s. hope you build that tesla transformer mentioned in the video smile.gif
esaruoho
QUOTE (thezman+Sep 15 2005, 07:47 PM)
Hi,

From what I have read it seems that the longitudinal waves of Tesla were scalar electrostatic waves, rather than electromagnetic vector waves. Not sure though.

z

from a rare interview on borderland science research foundation, gone between tom brown and eric dollard.. pagedown to the end of the quotes for dollard's definition of transverse+longitudinal electricity differences..


"The Tesla Magnifying Transmitter is a converter which converts electromagnetic energy into what is called magneto-dielectric energy.
T: What exactly is the dielectric side of electricity?
E: The side of electricity that represents the faster than light phenomenon."

"T: So the high voltage terminal of a properly built Tesla transmitter puts out a dielectric field?
E: Right - a dielectric current - a current of many amperes flowing through free space without any electrons. This is a true electrical current.
T: Is this as you've demonstrated to me where you can draw a several inch spark off the insulator, which of course isn't supposed to happen?
E: Right, an insulator isn't supposed to conduct electricity so how can you draw a spark off of it? (laughter)
"

"E:If we take Tesla's three phase electricity, or rotating magnetic field, we find that it is based on the archetypal form known as the Solar cross or by various other names.
T: Mandalas, medicine wheels?
E: ...these are four quadrant types of forms, a balanced cross as opposed to an unbalanced cross.
T: This is where you get the Four quadrant Theory of Electricity?
E: Electricity has to be viewed from a four quadrant type of situation. The right angle plays an extremely fundamental role in electricity. It is generally a right angle phenomenon."




-----
dollard's definition (grabbed from the interview) of tesla longitudinal, and transverse waves.

"The typical Hertzian, electromagnetic field of Transverse Waves is the gross by-product of a much more powerful, but hidden, energy envelope which is manifested as Longitudinal Standing Waves in a scalar nodal matrix, not propagated in the up and down, ocean wave fashion of Transverse Waves. "


(from Tesla's Longitudinal Electricity video):
Tesla experimented with impulse current and oscillating current.
our electricity is direct current and alternating current.

The Four Quadrant Theory of Electricity is
IMPULSE CURRENT, OSCILLATING CURRENT, DIRECT CURRENT, ALTERNATING CURRENT.
alternating current + direct current are transverse electromagnetic
impulse and oscillating current are longitudinal di-electric



konstantin meyl also likes to talk about scalar waves - instead of longitudinal energy. for some reason. i dont know - it seems they are the same thing?
i recently came across this 2003 lecture given in washington d.c.
"Power Engineering Scalar Field Theory - Faraday vs. Maxwell and Demonstration of Longitudinal Wave Transmission"

heres a few highlights from the description of it:

...explains how one can modify the basic equations of electromagnetic field to include longitudinal waves which results in a true revolution in electromagnetics...
...probably the only one in existence for english-speaking audience to correctly expand the classical electromagnetic field theory to include longitudinal/Tesla waves. The impact of such an expansion is immense and requires a complete change in thinking and a revision of the very foundations of physics in general. Do scalar waves exist or not? In Meyl's extended field theory they come about naturally eliminating the need for any "exotic" theories such as as superstrings, dark matter, revising even the theory of relativity. Meyl explains how Faraday's experiments were actually describing a much broader electromagnetics than was later derived by Maxwell and curtailed to an even more primitive state by others so that today's engineers are literally handicapped when using it....

....The missing experimental pieces eventually came from the work of Tesla and a small version of his wireless transmission of energy is demonstrated here, carrying electrical energy without losses to the other side of the table with an "impossible" 1.5-times the speed of light. During this amazing lecture Meyl takes you through the forgotten ideas of Nikola Tesla and explains how they are the missing pieces which prevented scientists to reach the goal of a comprehensible unified field theory. Along the course he also discusses many new applications which can now be not only better understood but also built and used in our every day life. Presented at the First Nikola Tesla Energy Science Conference & Exposition 2003 in Washington DC before astonished audience who just couldn't believe what they were seeing. 110 min. long. A must see for everyone.
...

i find on googlevideo two demonstrations by Konstantin Meyl, one chopped from that scalar wave lecture - where he shows tesla power transmission without wires.

also, he seems to insist on these things:


...transportation of information in nerves uses scalar waves - nature works only using scalar waves! (=longitudinal waves) - technical devices can also use scalar waves....
...tesla found that when transmitting information, the receiver received far more than was sent - that is why he called it the magnifying transmitter. ...
...you can have an electric longitudinal wave...
or a magnetic longitudinal wave ...
OR you can have a electromagnetic transverse wave....


anyone have any take on this stuff?



Photowhosawhatsit
Now completely ignoring the increase in radiation levels, and FCC no-fly zones that would result. Couldn't a capacitive relay system be used to "fold" the waveform and compact it to a more manageable "meters" size?
Mr.Electron
this is how Tesla was able to send power wirelessly

if you create a magnetic field and pass a conductor through it, the conductor will cross the lines of flux and generate a current. but that doesn't mean you would have to keep the conductor moving to get power. if you create a magnetic field generated by alternating current simply put the lines of flux will cross back and forth pass the conductor and power will be generated. the faster the lines are cut and the more there are to cut, the more power you would get. Induced Voltage

radio waves even of high intensity or amplitude can't generate much power

and as for there being a magnetic field around the earth
if you pass a conductor such as a plane around the the earth a small voltage would be induced because of the lines of flux being crossed

and you can still induce a voltage in a vacuum as well
GolobResearch
Concepts in physics . . . .
I. Electric, Magnetic, and Electromagnetic Fields or Forces:
1) A static electric field which is not time-varying has a electromagnetic energy wavelength of infinite length, meaning it does not produce EM energy;
2) A static electric field is produced by electrons (or other particles with a positive or negative static electric charge) which may or may not propogate its electric force in a longitudinal direction for an infinite length;
3) A static electric field which is propagating in a longitudinal direction produces a magnetic field described by the FIRST mathematical derivitive of the electric field with respect to time;
4) A static electric field which is propagating in a longitudinal direction and produces a magnetic field in a sinusoidal manner, with the direction of the vector magnetic field force repeatedly reversing its direction each cycle (or every one Hertz), produces an electromagnetic field described by the SECOND mathematical derivitive of the electric field with respect to time.

II. Gravity Produced By Objects With Mass Or By Acceleration Or Deacceleration:
1) Two or more objects which produce a magnetic or electromagnetic field will have their oppositive poles attracted to each other; this is NOT a gravitational force which causes the force between the magnetized objects.
2) Two or more objects which produce a magnetic or electromagnetic field and accelerate or deaccelerate their velocities relative to each other from their magnetic force of attraction or repulsion; and
a) are SIMILAR to two or more objects which accelerate or deaccelerate their
velocities relative to each other from a gravitational force of attraction
(Ref: General Theory of Relativity);
cool.gif produce only a WEAK gravitional field (or "gravitons") due to their
acceleration or deacceleration relative to each other.

III. Extremely low frequency electromagnetic fields:
1) Extremely low frequency electromagnetic fields will have their electrons at the source changing the direction of their velocity at a frequency that is usually less than ten cycles per second (10 Hertz);
2) Two or more extremely low frequency electromagnetic fields which INTERSECT, will produce a electromagnetic field of GREATER MAGNITUDE at the coordinates of intersection - This is the weaponization of electromagnetic fields.
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