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Re: Tesla's large pancake coil



Original poster: "D.C. Cox" <resonance@xxxxxxxxxxxx>




In this drawing it was definitely an artist's sketch.

In reality, a completely flat spiral Tesla transformer did exist. It is clearly visible in the rear of the photograph of Tesla's Houston Street Laboratory in New York City. It was visible behind Tesla's "spinning egg" exhibit he was developing for the Columbian Expo World's Fair in Chicago. A portion of this coil was tapped across as a primary, thus the partial primary drives the secondary --- very similar to the way a Variac can produce 140 or 280 vac from only 120 vac or 240 vac input.

Dr. Resonance

Many of the fantastic illustrations and even a few of the Tesla photographs from this era are known to be "conceptual illustrations" (faked). Most famous of these photos is the one of Tesla sitting next to a large helical coil while discharges strike all around him (double exposure). Some of the pen-and-ink illustrations used for press releases were commissioned by Tesla himself. This was not unusual for the time. Many of the cover illustrations for "Popular Science" and "Popular Electronics" up to the 1960's were of devices that never became reality. In general, if some illustration seems too amazing or too dangerous to make sense, it probably isn't real. A lot of amazing science is much more amazing than science.

Matt D.


In a message dated 9/28/06 2:28:00 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time, tesla@xxxxxxxxxx writes:
Original poster: William Beaty <billb@xxxxxxxxxx>



I stumbled across this newspaper illustration on Tesla Mem. Society site:

   A Demonstration Made at Tesla's Laboratory Yesterday
   http://www.teslasociety.com/pictures/teslaarticle2.jpg


Odd that the discharge goes *away* from the coil.   The coil's EM field
must sculpt the discharge path, no?


This appears to be the same device which hung in Wardencliffe:

   Wardenclyffe: exhibition of various inventions
   http://www.teslasociety.com/pictures/labpic.jpg


In these other famous photos, the sphere-electrode is not installed:

   http://www.teslasociety.com/posters/teslalab.jpg

   http://www.teslasociety.com/pictures/teslapic.jpg


Here's another artist's conception, again showing the discharge going away
from the coil.   I wonder if the discharge path was so reliable that Tesla
could actually sit as shown below?  Or is it just an "artist's
conception?"

   http://homepage.ntlworld.com/forgottenfutures/tesla/tesla_4.gif




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William J. Beaty                      SCIENCE HOBBYIST website
billb at amasci com                    http://amasci.com
EE/programmer/sci-exhibits   amateur science, hobby projects, sci fair
Seattle, WA  425-222-5066    unusual phenomena, tesla coils, weird sci