Re: Wireless Transmission

["Tesla list" <tesla@xxxxxxxxxx>]

Original poster: Ed Phillips <evp@xxxxxxxxxxx>

"I have never seen any experiment done by anyone with a Tesla coil that
would
deny this modern explanation. The near field was probably several miles
across with Tesla's big transmitter and I suppose he radiated a fair
amount
of power in the far field too, with that huge antenna mast.


Steve C."

	Actually,  his "huge antenna mast" was too short compared to a
wavelength to have radiated much at all at the frequencies he was
using.  All of his results must have been due to (loose) inductive or
capacitive coupling.

"A lot of this stuff, like the non-Hertzian waves, sounds very
compelling. I
am ashamed to admit I nearly built one of those caduceus coil things
myself
:-o But I now believe the whole thing is a myth and in fact Tesla just
didn't understand how energy really is propagated by EM waves. (Probably
nobody did in 1899.)"

	I think Hertz and Heaviside and some others probably did understand EM
propagation but the knowledge wasn't too widely known or used.  I'm sure
Tesla either didn't understand the theory or else rejected it as being
contrary to his notions.

"I have had fun reading the CSN and trying to understand how he was
thinking
at the time. As far as I can tell he thought the ground current from his
magnifier was driving the earth and ringing the whole globe like a big
spherical electrode. All the energy was transmitted through the ground
while
the topload just acted as a "counterweight" or charge reservoir to let
the
drive work."

	The Tesla who emerges from CSN is a guy who knew the math and physics
of the day and applied them to meaningful calculations of what he was
doing.  It's only after he returned from CS that his speculations
started to get what seems, at least to some of us, as really wild. I
often wonder if some of the problems with reading Tesla's writings is
that the terminology he used has different meanings to us from what he
meant at the time.  As for exciting the globe at its resonant
frequencies, he had no concept of the losses involved in those
resonances and apparently led himself to believe that somehow the earth
(and ionized upper atmosphere) were perfect conductors.  Alas, many,
many orders of magnitude wrong!  Even though they're excited by lots of
power from lightning bolts they are so weak as to be barely detectable
while, if he had been correct, they would result in enormous signals.

	If he were still around I'd ask Tesla these questions about his
wireless power transmission system.

1. How did you propose to excite the upper atmosphere by a conductor
suspended from a balloon or other levitator without breaking down the
intervening atmosphere and having all of your energy shunted off there?

2. Did you ever calculate the capacitance of your transmission line
comprised of the "conducting layer" and the surface of the earth?

3. Did you ever calculate the losses involved in charging that
transmission line?  Did you ever calculate the reactive energy stored in
it as part of your resonant system?  You complained of high ground
resistance both at CS and at Wardenclyffe so you must have some idea of
its magnitude on a global scale.

More, but this would do for starters and I ask the same questions of
anyone promoting the system as it is so clearly described in his
numerous patents.

Ed