Re: 12 MV 100 years ago

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

Original poster: "boris petkovic by way of Terry Fritz <teslalist-at-qwest-dot-net>" <petkovic7-at-yahoo-dot-com>


 > Hi All,
 >
 >  >From the TCBOR Guide to the Colorado Springs
 > Notes, it says that on July 25
 > Tesla blew the input fusing at 15KW.  His
 > Westinghouse xfmr could handle
 > about 60KVA at 60KV.
---
He had used 15 kW already in New York City before
coming to CS.
Coils in his lab in Houston street were producing
discharges over 16' point to point.
That's why he needed bigger lab and (not just lab but
OPEN space as well).The most powerful discharges in
Colorado were certainly those emanenting from sphere
elevated above roof.There are unpublished photograps
showing 38' footers breaking out from 3' sphere in
that position.
As concerns W.Transformer see Tesla's remark for July
7.Tesla calculated he would need 50 hp to power his
system but psu in question could be overloaded few
times more without problem (only if needed according
to his words).
As concerns 8 MV  claim that's way overestimated
figure.
Seems Tesla  believed that over 3 MV in high BPS Tesla
coil duty was needed for streamers to start coming
from d=30" "isolated in space"  sphere (obviously,the
knowledge of gas behaviour under E-field stress was
poor in his time).Also,today we know that super high
voltage isn't necessary (not a critical factor) for
bottling up longish Tesla coil streamers.
My guestimate for max voltage : 2-3 MV in the best
case.
True he didn't like to overvolt bottle caps,but he was
using 1000+ BPS and could be processing respectable
power levels neverthless.Thus about max power draw I
really wouldn't know to tell.It's a quite a chance,
some most striking experiments he didn't write down in
his notes.
Perhaps 25 kilometers+ discharge echo from his station
(heard by many people at one night) isn't a fairy tale
after all.
BTW,Golka on the same coil geometry used over 150 kVA

without problems to system.

cheers,
Boris