RE: Terry's Test - Two Manifestations of Charge

["Tesla list" <tesla@xxxxxxxxxx>]

Original poster: "David Thomson" <dwt@xxxxxxxxxxxx>

Hi Terry,

> The copper pipe produced the effect just fine:
>
> http://hot-streamer.com/temp/DaveTest-20.jpg

Interesting.

> >I'm wondering whether the
> >displacement currents are peculiar to the gas tube or whether
any
> >conductor will pick them up.
>
> Any conductor or sort of conductor should work fine.

That appears to be the case.  Now we know that an extremely short
conductor has no effect, and that a long conductor has a
pronounced effect.  Apparently the surface area of the conductor
plays a role.  This would indicate the conductor is acting as an
antenna.  Well, this opens a lot of door for further exploration.
I'll see if I can get my coil working again tomorrow.

> >Also, could you try both the tube and the rod with their
> opposite ends grounded?
>
> I think grounding the copper rod is a trivial case ;-))

Nothing is trivial.  Sometimes things aren't what we expect.  I
remember a teacher wouldn't perform an experiment from a science
book in the 9th grade.  It involved holding a ping pong ball in
an inverted funnel and blowing air down into the funnel and then
releasing the ball.  We had to predict what would happen.  I
predicted the ball would stay inside the funnel until the air
stopped.  The teacher said I was wrong and closed the book.  I
protested that the scientific method involved doing experiments,
not guessing.  He got snotty with me and tried to embarrass me in
the class and told me to try it.  I could tell he already had a
half dozen one liners ready to go when the ball blew out the
bottom.  But I did the experiment and my intuition was right.
The air flowed around the ball and the resulting pressure kept
the ball floating as long as the air was moving through the
funnel neck.  He then apologized and confessed that he ignored
this experiment for the past three years because he thought it
was stupid.  Nothing is trivial.

> I tried the tube but it was far too conductive and just
> shorted the spark to ground:
>
> http://hot-streamer.com/temp/DaveTest-21.jpg
>
> I tried wrapping the foil on the outside but it still was too
> conductive:
>
> http://hot-streamer.com/temp/DaveTest-22.jpg

Did you check to see if the bright white spark would manifest at
the bottom of the tube if the same gap were present as at the
top?

> we can just remove the toroid to rod wire all together:
>
> http://hot-streamer.com/temp/DaveTest-23.jpg
>
> Now it is much more obvious what is going on.  I had to turn
> the power down since it kept wanting to arc over, but it is
> easy to get it to where just the floating rod arcs to the
ground wire.

Well, of course, we see this all the time when we touch objects
in the room while the coil is operating.

Okay, you have a thin purple spark on the tube to ground side.
Can you capture a transition from thin purple to bright white, or
does it change suddenly?

Dave