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KV for FREE.
Subject: KV for FREE.
Date: Tue, 27 May 97 09:10:04 EDT
From: pierson-at-ggone.ENET.dec-dot-com
To: tesla-at-pupman-dot-com
>>Are you saying that a tethered conductive balloon at say 30 meters
>>could have several thousands volts wrt ground,
>Yes.
In addition to could, in normal circumstances _would_.
>>I'm guessing there is no practical way
>>to use this gradient to do any useful work, like say charge the
>>primary cap of a TC.
>Can do, IF you are willing to wait a long time. HI Z implies a long
>time constant.
Yep.
> (Old memory here) Several people have been killed by the
>discharge from insulated Radio Towers that they came in contact with.
>These tower were charged by the atmospheric electric field. (again,
>this is an old memory here, don't ask me for biblo data;(
Any book by Uman (who writes much, professional and general
consumption, on lightning and atmospheric electricity.)
Normal gradient in the atmospere as 100-200 V/Meter. In
Theory, one can set a voltmeter with one lead grounded and
read this back. BUT, the common voltmenters are way to
low an impedance, and, effectively short circuit the normal
field. The human body ("...an ugly bag of mostly water..."
to quote a Star Trek alien) Handily shorts this field in our
vicinity.
When a storm is around, the field goes up. Once it goes high
enough the 'prickling of the skin' starts to be felt.
The engineering challenges are daunting. Since the currents
available are tiny, (to use a technical term 8)>>) _surface
leakage_ is, in most cases, enough to 'short out the power
supply'.
=======================
[note to students of the 'chopped line phenomenon' I'm still getting
some. _this post_ came thru with none & I've artifically limited my
line length to avoid. (I'm not crabbing, just providing trouble
shooting info....)]
regards
dwp