Magnifying transmitter

The magnifying transmitter is an advanced version of a Tesla Coil. It is a high power harmonic oscillator that Nikola Tesla proposed for the wireless transmission of electrical energy.^* Tesla's apparatus is a high-voltage, air-core, multiple-resonant transformer that can generate very high voltages at high frequency. He originally termed it self-regenerative resonant transformer, a term that is no longer in general use.

History

The first 'Magnifier' was assembled in New York City in the period between 1895 - 1898.In 1899 a larger magnifier was constructed in Colorado Springs, Colorado. This machine was used to conduct fundamental experiments in wireless telecommunications and electrical power transmission. Measuring fifty-one feet in diameter, it developed a working potential estimated at 3.5 - 4 million volts and was capable of producing electrical discharges exceeding one hundred feet in length (30.5 meters).[2

Tesla's Colorado lab was located
in a high geomagnetic location
(Colorado_GeoMag_Map.png)

Colorado arrival

In 1899, Tesla decided to move and began research in Colorado Springs. He chose this location primarily because of the frequent thunderstorms, the high altitude (where the air, being at a lower pressure, had a lower dielectric breakdown strength, making it easier to ionize), and the dryness of the air (minimizing leakage of electric charge through insulators). Tesla kept a diary of his experiments in the Colorado Springs lab where he spent nearly nine months. It consists of 500 pages of handwritten notes and nearly 200 drawings, recorded chronologically between June 1, 1899 and January 7, 1900, as the work occurred, containing explanations of his experiments.

Tuned electrical circuit

While in Colorado, Tesla constructed many smaller resonance transformers and conducted further research of tuned electrical circuits. Tesla also designed various coherers for detecting and separating electromagnetic waves, and rotating coherers which he used to detect the unique types of electromagnetic phenomenon he observed. These used a mechanism of geared wheels driven by a coiled spring-drive mechanism which rotated small glass cylinders. These experiments were the final stage of years of work on synchronized tuned electrical circuits. These transceivers were constructed to demonstrate how signals could be "tuned" to respond to specific signals while rejecting others. Tesla logged in his diary on July 3, 1899 that a separate resonance transformer tuned to the same high frequency as a larger high-voltage resonance transformer (which acted as a transmitter) would receive energy from the larger coil, demonstrating transmission of wireless energy. This experiment was used to confirm Tesla's patent for radio during later disputes in the courts. These air core high-frequency resonant coils were the predecessors of systems from radio to medical magnetic resonance imaging .

Power transmission

On July 3, 1899, Tesla discovered terrestrial stationary waves within the earth. He demonstrated that the Earth behaves as a smooth polished conductor and possesses electrical vibrations. Tesla demonstrated that the Earth could respond at predescribed frequencies of electrical vibrations. Tesla conducted experiments contributing to the understanding of electromagnetic propagation and the Earth's resonance. He transmitted signals several kilometres and lit neon tubes conducting through the ground.

Tesla researched ways to transmit energy wirelessly over long distances (via transverse waves, to a lesser extent, and, more readily, longitudinal waves). He transmitted extremely low frequencies through the ground as well as between the earth's surface and the Kennelly-Heaviside layer. He received patents on wireless transcievers that developed standing waves by this method. In his experiments, he made mathematical calculations and computations based on his experiments and discovered that the resonant frequency of the Earth was approximately 8 Hz (Hertz). In the 1950s, researchers confirmed that the resonant frequency of the Earth's ionospheric cavity was in this range.

The Magnifying Transmitter was the basis for Tesla's Wardenclyffe Tower project. Although modern Tesla coils are designed to generate disruptive discharges, this system was designed for wireless communication and power transmission via longitudinal waves and telluric currents. In 1925, John B. Flowers advanced a proposal to test Tesla's system and to implement the system. H. L. Curtis, the chief of the Bureau of Standards Radio Laboratory in Washington D.C., and J. H. Dillinger, a physicist, reviewed the proposal but declined to implement the proposed plan. Flower's mechanical analogy test was successful, though. ^*

Telegeodynamics

Tesla conceived of a system, during this time experimenting with the Magnifier, of geophysical exploration - seismology - which he called telegeodynamics. This was based on his reciprocating mechanical oscillator patented in 1894 and he explained that a long sequence of small explosions could be used to find ore and create earthquakes large enough to destroy the Earth. He did not experiment with this as he felt there would not be "a desirable outcome". Tesla also constructed many smaller resonance transformers and discovered the concept of tuned electrical circuits.

Magnifying Transmitter

The electrical oscillator, cited by Dr. Tesla as his most important and greatest invention, consists of three inductors:

an air-core transformer (2 coils)
a third coil (1 extra coil)

The magnifier operated as a base-driven quarter-wave helical resonator. It is reported that Tesla operated the magnifier at 100 kHz. The oscillator created earth currents of such magnitude that sparks an inch long could be drawn from a water main at a distance of 300 feet from the laboratory station.

Transmitter details

The layout of the Wardenclyffe magnifying transmitter is fairly well known, based upon Tesla's patents and various photographs [3,6 in which the concept was implemented. The magnifying transmitter is not identical to the classic Tesla coil. It has the short thick primary and longer secondary inductors characteristic of the Tesla coil, although their magnetic coupling is tighter. Because of this, more aggressive measures have to be taken in terms of primary spark quenching and providing additional insulation between the primary and secondary. In addition to the two large-diameter coils that comprise the master oscillator, Tesla added a third inductor called the "extra coil." Tesla experimented with the magnifying transmitter using continuous wave and damped-wave resonant modes.

The extra coil or helical resonator is physically separated from the two close-coupled coils which comprise the master oscillator or driver section. The power from the master oscillator is fed to the lower end of the extra coil resonator through a large diameter electrical conductor or pipe to inimize corona. The magnifying transmitter's base-driven extra coil behaves as a slow-wave helical resonator, the axial disturbance propagating at a velocity of less than 1% up to around 10% the speed of light in free space. The Magnifying Transmitter's axial velocity electromagnetic field is established by the coil pitch and electrical charge propagation speed through the circuit. It is interesting to note that rigorous mathematical descriptions of Tesla's Magnifier did not become available until 50-100 years after Tesla's pioneering work. Modern analyses have tried to apply distributed "transmission line" descriptions of the "extra coil" rather than the usual lumped-constant analysis. Recently developed theories of resonator behavior show that, although distributed analysis is more accurate for all excitation modes, lumped analysis can be effectively used to design practical Tesla coils and Magnifiers.

Operation

Using low frequency harmonic Maxwellian oscillations, Tesla attempted to develop up standing waves of extremely low frequency in the Earth's electro-magnetic circuit. Based upon observations made with the device, Tesla reported that a type of Earth resonance can be excited (An example of an earth resonance is the Schumann resonance). Tesla states that he discovered with the device that Earth's resonance can be excited. Tesla set up standing electomagnetic waves with the Magnifying Transmitter in the telluric potential energy.

It has been proposed by some that Tesla was utilizing Earth's magnetic fields' extremely low frequencies in a global resonator of power and information. Some posit that this variation of the Tesla coil was mainly intended for wireless transmissions of information. In normal operation the device is relatively silent, generating a high power electric field, but if the output voltage exceeds the design of the elevated terminal, high-voltage sparks may strike out from the electrode into the air. Tesla became the first man to create electrical effects on the scale of lightning. Cripple Creek residents could hear thunder coming from his lab produced by the Colorado Springs machine.

It has been reported that Colorado Springs residents near the lab would observe sparks emitting from the ground to their feet and through their shoes. Electrical sparks could be observed from the local water main that was used, at times, as a ground connection. The area around the laboratory would glow with corona (similar to the phenomena of St. Elmo's Fire). One of Tesla's experiments damaged a Colorado Springs Electric Company generator by backfeeding high frequency radio frequency into the city's power distribution system.

Related Tesla Patents

"System of Electric Lighting," , 23 June 1891
"Means for Generating Electric Currents," , 6 February 1894
"Electrical Transformer," , 2 November 1897
"Method of and Apparatus for Controlling Mechanism of Moving Vehicle or Vehicles ", , 8 November 1898
"System of Transmission of Electrical Energy," , Mar. 20, 1900
"Apparatus for Transmission of Electrical Energy," , 15 May 1900
"System of Transmission of Electrical Energy," , 20 March 1900
"Apparatus for Utilizing Effects Transmitted from a Distance to a Receiving Device through Natural Media," , Nov. 5, 1901
"Method of Utilizing Effects Transmitted through Natural Media," , Nov. 5, 1901
"Apparatus for Utilizing Effects Transmitted From A Distance To A Receiving Device Through Natural Media," , Nov. 5, 1901
"Apparatus for Utilizing Effects Transmitted through Natural Media," , Nov. 5, 1901
"Method Of Utilizing Radiant Energy," '', 5 November 1901
"Method of Signaling," '', Mar. 17, 1903
"System of Signaling," '', Apr. 14, 1903
"Art of Transmitting Electrical Energy through the Natural Mediums," , Apr. 18, 1905
"Apparatus for Transmitting Electrical Energy," Jan. 18, 1902, , Dec. 1, 1914

See also: List of Tesla patents

External links and resources

Antonio Carlos M. de Queiroz "Designing a Tesla Magnifier" (Theoretical and practical approaches to Tesla magnifier design)
Tesla Technology Research - Tesla Coils and the Failure of Lumped-Element Circuit Theory
Nicholson, Paul The Tesla Secondary Simulation Project (theoretical simulation of Tesla Coil resonators, confirmed by experiment)
Jean-Louis Naudin's Magnifying Transmitter
Practical Magnifier Construction Principles: Making it work
Nicholson, Paul The Real Science of "Non-Hertzian" Waves (This essay does not concentrate on longitudinal waves nor telluric currents, it's focus is on transverse waves)
Cooper, John. F., "Magnifying Transmitter circuit diagram; alternate circuit diagram". Tesla-Coil.com.

References

^* - The Autobiography of Nikola Tesla, Hart Brothers, 1982, Ch. 5, ISBN 0910077002

^* - Nikola Tesla : Guided Weapons & Computer Technology, Leland I. Anderson, Twenty First Century Books, 1998, pp. 12-13, ISBN 0963601296.

^* - Anderson, Leland I., "Nikola Tesla on his work with alternating currents and their application to wireless telegraphy, telephony, and transmission of power". Twenty First Century Books, 2002, pp. 74, 89-90, 107, 111, ISBN 1893817016.

^* - Apparatus for Transmission of Electrical Energy, U.S. Patent No. 649,621, 15 May 1900

^* - Apparatus for Transmitting Electrical Energy, Jan. 18, 1902, U.S. Patent 1,119,732, Dec. 1, 1914

^* - Tesla, Nikola, "Colorado Springs Notes", 1899-1900, Nikola Tesla Museum, Beograd, 1978.

^* - Valone, Thomas, "Harnessing the Wheelwork of Nature". ISBN 1-931882-04-5

Nikola Tesla | Transformers (electrical)

Gourt Home::Gourt :: Magnifying transmitter