Re: SA's latest issue

["Tesla list" <tesla-at-pupman-dot-com>]

Original poster: "Ed Phillips by way of Terry Fritz <twftesla-at-uswest-dot-net>" <evp-at-pacbell-dot-net>

Tesla list wrote:
> 
> Original poster: "John H. Couture by way of Terry Fritz
<twftesla-at-uswest-dot-net>" <couturejh-at-worldnet.att-dot-net>
> 
> Note that the spac
e shuttle tether experiment uses the ionosphere as the
> return conductor. 

	Think it was no where near that simple!

> I understand this produced about 5000 volts at one amp or
> 5000 watts. The ionospere is a colosal electrical conductor with negligible
> losses at high voltages. 

	Think you will find that the conductivity is really quite low.  

> Tesla planned to use the ionosphere and the earth
> as the two necessary conductors for his world electrical system providing
> power with minimum losses. 

	Can't find any place in his publications where he considered the
capacitance between the ionosphere and ground, or calculated the
attenuation/power loss due to the resistance of the ionosphere and that
capacitance.  Think that it's far more than allowable to achieve his
claimed efficiency numbers or anything within many orders of magnitude
of them!  That seems kind of strange for someone who normally paid
meticulous (sp?) attention to details, and calculated almost
everything.  He surely knew enough to calculate that capacitance from
first principles, but not sure how he would have estimated ionospheric
conductivity.  In this matter I'm afraid our boy had feet of
clay,,,,,,,,,,,,

> He said this was not using Hertzian waves.

	That he did (say); made quite a point out of it.  On the other hand,
however, anecdotes aside, he never demonstrated anything useful in the
way of high-efficiency power transmission.
 
> Tesla was also interested in wireless transmission for communications using
> Hertzian waves (electromagnetic radiation) which do not require conductors.
> Tesla's dual circuit patents covered both of these methods of electrical
> energy transmission.

	In that area his patents were complete and inclusive.  He demonstrated
that he knew what he was talking about.

> 
> John Couture

Ed