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Re: Electric bath? ... X-rays from light bulbs/Tesla Coils

Hi Jeff,

>THANK you for this email.  When I started out fiddling around with Violet
>Rays and different smaller Tesla Coils, knowing nothing anything about
>Tesla, sparks, or radiation I was lighting up Edison bulbs and noting that
>the glass phosphoresced a beautiful yellow green colour, and that the
>filaments and posts inside cast black shadows on the glass.  Didn't have a
>clue what was going on.  I must have played quite a long time with this
>light bulb, and in the weeks time acquired a half dozen or so more bulbs to
>play with, and found similar results.

YES, the antique bulbs, like the Edison, ARE producing x-rays.  When the
filament side is touched to the Tesla or Oudin coil and the other side is
capacitively grounded, the yellowish-green fluorescence is the tell-tale
sign.  When I was a kid and didn't know this, I had a collection of antique
bulbs and an old handheld Tesla (really Oudin) coil.  I used to love to hold
the bulb while touching the filament side to the coil end to see the
"northern light" type colors produced.   My fingers in this case were
forming the capacitive ground.  It was only when I got older and started
reading up on x-ray production that I realized what was going on.  And one
day, I proved it to myself with a Geiger counter as the needle was pegged
when the probe was placed a foot away from the activated bulb.  To anyone
out there reading this, DON'T TRY IT without the proper shielding or
distance.  You can easily get irradiated and not realize it until later.
>
>I probably also REALLY did some sort of damage to myself and would NOT
>recommend that anyone experiment with Crookes Tubes and X-ray tubes without
>knowledge of safety/etc.

Yes, there is a chance especially if your fingers were the ground as they
would receive the highest intensity of x-rays produced.  Thankfully, the
intensity wouldn't be too great because the handheld coils produce small
currents, MUCH less than commercial x-ray generators.   And it would be the
voltage and current amounts going into the bulb that would determine the
quality and quantity of x-rays produced.  Still, I read somewhere that an
induction coil powered Crookes tube was measured at 12 R/hr with the Geiger
probe at something like a 12 inch distance.   Not something I'd want to be
exposed to for very long, that's for sure.

>I recreated Röntgens experiments without knowing it ( = yikes!).

Probably a lot of Tesla coilers have, especially if they've any type of high
vacuum bulb sitting around while fiddling with the coil (You can even get
x-rays WITHOUT the bulb being connected to anything, just lying near a high
voltage source).

>I do have to say that the effect is quite beautiful.

Yes, beautiful, but potentially deadly!


>Tesla created a uni-polar x-ray tube, of which I have drawings adapted for
>the Violet Ray and Diathermy Machines.  It has one electrode, the other
>being formed by condenser action on approaching the tube to a grounded
>object (the person being x-rayed).
>Again, above I noticed that when I touched my hand to the top of the light
>bulb, the phosphorescence greatly increased.
>I Hate to know what sort of damage I could have/DID cause from these
>experiments.


Yeah, it's no wonder so many people died from early x-ray experiments.  Not
knowing the damage being caused to their bodies, doctors would expose
patients to the x-ray "lamps" for maybe 10 minutes in order to obtain a good
radiograph.  These early tubes were powered by strong Rhumkorff coils and so
x-ray intensity would be much higher.    Ten minutes is all it would take to
cause cancer a few years later, or to produce burns that wouldn't heal.

>Jeff
>


John