RE: [TCML] Running a TC in snow

["Dave Halliday" <dh@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

I forget a lot of the particulars.

My Dad worked in England during WW-II (he was born there and moved here at
age 14). He is a Physicist and worked on RADAR.

We went over to Europe for his sabbatical in 1960 and toured through some of
his old labs.  I forget which lab it was - I think Cavendish - they still
had the ladder with the charred footprints on it. They were working with
high voltage (Cockcroft-Walton) and particle accelerators and the way to
measure the voltage was to climb up the ladder holding a ball on the end of
a bakelite rod. The ball had a grounded wire attached to it. When you drew
an arc, your position on the ladder would give you the voltage.

One day, the other end of the wire came loose from its ground terminal.

The guy survived.

Dave

 

> -----Original Message-----
> From: tesla-bounces@xxxxxxxxxx 
> [mailto:tesla-bounces@xxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Ed Phillips
> Sent: Sunday, December 21, 2008 4:53 PM
> To: Tesla Coil Mailing List
> Subject: Re: [TCML] Running a TC in snow
> 
> Hello.
> I recently watched a TV program where power maintenance workers were
> cleaning insulators on  HV lines using a helicopter and a 
> high pressure
> water cannon blasting distilled water. The commentator stressed the
> importance of the water being absolutely pure. I suppose 
> otherwise it would
> form a bridge no doubt between adjacent lines. So yes 
> distilled water is
> non-conductive: something I never knew until seeing that program. 
> So if the snow was formed from pure water, which is very 
> unlikely, it may be
> an insulator."
> 
> 	I've watched Southern California Edison Company workers 
> washing of insulators on the 220 kV transmission line near 
> us.  Have tanker trucks with spray nozzle on top AND FILL UP 
> THE TRUCK FROM THE FIRE HYDRANTS!!!!  I suspect the water is 
> pure enough that they don't get an arc back along the spray.  
> I've never gotten close enough when they're spraying [not on 
> public streets] to see if they have a safety ground but would 
> think they must.  Maybe someone here with power company 
> experience knows more.
> 
> 	About 60 years ago I visited an SCE hydro station at 
> Big Creek, CA, in the high Sierras.  One of the guys who 
> worked there showed off by standing on a wooden stool with a 
> screwdriver in his hand and drawing arcs off the 200 kV line 
> leaving the station!!!!  Not particularly dry place since the 
> hydro turbine was only a few feet away and room was cold and 
> sorta damp.  As a matter of interest this was in 1948 and and 
> Dr. Sorenson, head of the Caltech EE department and the guy 
> leading the field trip, told us that that particular turbine 
> [forget the power] had been running without a single shut 
> down since he supervised its installation in 1913, 34 years 
> before.  Hydro power is great and it's too bad the tree 
> huggers are trying to get all of the big dams pulled down.  
> Wonder what Tesla would think about that movement?
> 
> Ed
> 
> 
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