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Re: Lightning Generator
Subject: Re: Lightning Generator
Date: Wed, 7 May 1997 14:36:21 +1200
From: "Malcolm Watts" <MALCOLM-at-directorate.wnp.ac.nz>
Organization: Wellington Polytechnic, NZ
To: tesla-at-pupman-dot-com
Re this....
> From: "Thomas McGahee" <tom_mcgahee-at-sigmais-dot-com>
> To: "Tesla List" <tesla-at-pupman-dot-com>
>
>
>
> ----------
> > From: Tesla List <tesla-at-pupman-dot-com>
> > To: tesla-at-poodle.pupman-dot-com
> > Subject: Re: Lightning Generator
> > Date: Monday, May 05, 1997 2:22 AM
> >
> > Subject: Re: Lightning Generator
> > Date: Sun, 4 May 1997 19:17:48 -0700 (PDT)
> > From: "Edward V. Phillips" <ed-at-alumni.caltech.edu>
> > To: tesla-at-pupman-dot-com
> >
> >
> > " A lightning stroke has a
> > fast rise time, it is a RF voltage."
> >
> > No way! Primarily unipolar with a rise time of a few
> > microseconds and a fall time of tens to hundreds.
> >
> > Ed
>
> Ed,
> It is a single polarity, true... but what makes something RF is the
> "apparent" frequency of a 1/2 cycle, which of course is a unipolar
> definition, is it not? Some Tesla coil builders use a DC supply to
> supply raw power to the tank circuit. The gap fires and we call it
> RF. And to take it to its extreme, a Tesla coil operated in ONE SHOT
> mode only gets a single half cycle of excitation. But it STILL
> operates as a resonant RF circuit anyhow.
>
> >From this perspective Malcolm is correct in saying that the lightning
> STROKE is RF. BEFORE the lightning strike the potentials involved are
> INDEED DC. But with the stroke itself the basic phenomenon changes
> radically and is indeed RF. Otherwise it wouldn't mess up the
> reception on your AM radio :)
>
> Fr. Tom McGahee
I think credit for that statement belongs to Mark Graalman. However,
I also hold the view that any step function generates RF. I am always
amused when people talk about hearing "static" on the radio. That is
clearly an oxymoron.
Malcolm