Magnifying Transmitter

A publicity photo of Tesla sitting in the Colorado Springs experimental station with his "magnifying transmitter." The arcs are about 22 feet (7 m) long. (Tesla's notes identify this as a Double exposure.)

The magnifying transmitter is an advanced harmonic oscillator of the electrical Tesla coil, used for the wireless transmission of electrical energy.[1] Nikola Tesla's apparatus is a high-voltage, air-core, self-regenerative resonant transformer that generates very high voltages at high frequency.

History

The first 'magnifier' was assembled in New York City in the period between 1895 - 1898.[1] In 1899 a larger magnifying transmitter was constructed in Colorado Springs, and used to conduct fundamental experiments in wireless telecommunications and electrical power transmission. Measuring fifty-one feet in diameter, it developed a working potential in the order of 3.5 - 4 million volts and was capable of producing electrical discharges exceeding one hundred feet in length (30.5 meters).[2]

Tesla's Colorado lab was located
in a high geomagnetic location
(Larger)

In 1899, Tesla decided to move and began research in Colorado Springs, Colorado, where he could have room for his high-voltage high-frequency experiments. He chose this location primarily because of the frequent thunderstorms, the high altitude (where the air, being at a lower pressure, had a lower dielectric breakdown strength, making it easier to ionize), and the dryness of the air (minimizing leakage of electric charge through insulators). Also, the property was free and electric power available from the El Paso Power Company. Tesla reached Colorado Springs on May 17, 1899. Upon his arrival he told reporters that he was conducting experiments transmitting signals from Pikes Peak to Paris. He was developing a system for wireless telegraphy, telephony, and the transmission of power. Be began his experimentation with high-voltage electricity and investigated the possibility of wirelessly transmitting and distributing large amounts of electrical energy over long distances. Tesla's time at this lab has been a wellspring for urban legends about him.

Tesla kept a diary of his experiments in the Colorado Springs lab where he spent nearly nine months. It consists of 500 pages of handwritten notes and nearly 200 drawings, recorded chronologically between June 1, 1899 and January 7, 1900, as the work occurred, containing explanations of his experiments. He was developing a system for wireless telegraphy, telephony and the transmission of power, experimented with high-voltage electricity and the possibility of wireless transmitting and distributing large amounts of electrical energy over long distances.

On July 3, 1899, Tesla discovered terrestrial stationary waves within the earth. He demonstrated that the Earth behaves as a smooth polished conductor and possesses electrical vibrations. Tesla demonstrated that the Earth could respond at predescribed frequencies of electrical vibrations. Tesla conducted experiments contributing to the understanding of electromagnetic propagation and the Earth's resonance. He transmitted signals several kilometres and lit neon tubes conducting through the ground.

Tesla researched ways to transmit energy wirelessly over long distances (utilizing the ionosphere and the ground's telluric currents via transverse waves, to a lesser extent, and, more readily, longitudinal waves). He transmitted extremely low frequencies through the ground as well as between the earth's surface and the Kennelly-Heaviside layer. He recieved patents on wireless that developed standing waves by this method. In his experiments, he made mathematical calculations and computations based on his experiments and discovered that the resonant frequency of the Earth was approximately 8 Hz (Hertz). In the 1950s, researchers confirmed resonant frequency was in this range.

The Magnifying Transmitter was the basis for Tesla's Wardenclyffe Tower project. Although the usual Tesla coils are designed to generate disruptive discharges, this system was designed for wireless communication and power transmission via longitudinal waves and telluric currents. In 1925, John B. Flowers advanced a proposal to test Tesla's system and to implement the system. H. L. Curtis, the chief of the Bureau of Standards Radio Laboratory in Washington D.C., and J. H. Dillinger, a physicist, reviewed the proposal but declined to implement the proposed plan. Flower's mechanical analogy test was successful, though. [7]

Magnifying Transmitter

The layout of the Wardenclyffe magnifying transmitter is fairly well known, based upon Tesla's patents [4,5] and various photographs [3,6] in which the concept was implemented. The magnifying transmitter is not identical to the classic Tesla coil. It has the short thick primary and longer secondary inductors characteristic of the Tesla coil, although their coupling is tighter. Because of this, more aggressive measures have to be taken in terms of primary spark quenching. In addition to the two large-diameter coils comprising the master oscillator, Tesla added a third inductor called the "extra coil." Tesla worked with the magnifying transmitter in a continuous wave mode and in a damped-wave resonant mode. Successful analyses focus on the distributed "transmission line" description of the "extra coil" (rather than the usual lumped-constant analysis).

The extra coil or helical resonator is physically separated from the two close-coupled coils which comprise the master oscillator section. The power from the master oscillator is fed to the lower end of the extra coil resonator through a heavy electrical conductor. The magnifying transmitter's base-driven extra coil behaves as a slow-wave helical resonator, the axial disturbance propagating at a velocity of less than 1% up to around 10% the speed of light in free space. The Magnifying Transmitter's axial velocity electromagnetic field is established by the coil pitch and electrical charge propagation speed through the circuit.

Operation

Using low frequency harmonic Maxwellian oscillations, he attempted to set up standing waves of extremely low frequency in the Earth's electro-magnetic circuit. Based upon observations made with the device, Tesla reported that a type of Earth resonance can be excited (An example of an earth resonance is the Schumann resonance). Tesla states that he discovered with the device that Earth's resonance can be excited. Tesla set up standing electomagnetic waves with the Magnifying Transmitter in the telluric potential energy.

It has been proposed by some that Tesla was ultilizing Earth's magnetic fields' extremely low frequencies in a global resonator of power and information. Some posit that this variation of the Tesla coil was mainly intended for wireless transmissions of information. In normal operation the device is relatively silent, generating a high power electric field, but if the output voltage exceeds the design of the elevated terminal, high-voltage sparks may strike out from the electrode into the air. Tesla became the first man to create electrical effects on the scale of lightning. Cripple Creek residents could hear thunder coming from his lab produced by the Colorado Springs machine.

Colorado Springs residents near the lab would observe sparks emitting from the ground to their feet and through their shoes. Electrical sparks could be observed from the local water main that was used, at times, as a ground connection. The area around the laboratory would glow with a blue plasma corona (similar to the phenomena of St. Elmo's Fire). One of Tesla's experiments damaged a Colorado Springs Electric Company generator by backfeeding high frequency radio frequency into the city's power distribution system.

Related Tesla Patents

• "System of Electric Lighting," Template:US patent, June 23, 1891
• "Means for Generating Electric Currents," Template:US patent, February 6, 1894
• "Electrical Transformer," Template:US patent, November 2, 1897
• "Method of and Apparatus for Controlling Mechanism of Moving Vehicle or Vehicles ", Template:US patent, November 8, 1898
• "System of Transmission of Electrical Energy," Template:US patent, Mar. 20, 1900
• "Apparatus for Transmission of Electrical Energy," Template:US patent, May 15, 1900
• "System of Transmission of Electrical Energy," Template:US patent, March 20, 1900
• "Apparatus for Utilizing Effects Transmitted from a Distance to a Receiving Device through Natural Media," Template:US patent, Nov. 5, 1901
• "Method of Utilizing Effects Transmitted through Natural Media," Template:US patent, Nov. 5, 1901
• "Apparatus for Utilizing Effects Transmitted From A Distance To A Receiving Device Through Natural Media," Template:US patent, Nov. 5, 1901
• "Apparatus for Utilizing Effects Transmitted through Natural Media," Template:US patent, Nov. 5, 1901
• "Method Of Utilizing Radiant Energy," Template:US patent, November 5, 1901
• "Method of Signaling," Template:US patent, Mar. 17, 1903
• "System of Signaling," Template:US patent, Apr. 14, 1903
• "Art of Transmitting Electrical Energy through the Natural Mediums," Template:US patent, Apr. 18, 1905
• "Apparatus for Transmitting Electrical Energy," Jan. 18, 1902, Template:US patent, Dec. 1, 1914

See also: List of Tesla patents

Further readings

Tesla's publications

• Tesla, Nikola, "On the Transmission of Electricity Without Wires". Electrical World and Engineer, March 5, 1904.

Electrical World

• "The Development of High Frequency Currents for Practical Application"., The Electrical World, Vol 32, No. 8.
• "Boundless Space: A Bus Bar". The Electrical World, Vol 32, No. 19.
• "Mr. Tesla's Application of the Hertz-Wave Transmission". The Electrical World, Vol 32, No. 8.

Other publications

• Bass, Robert W., "Self-Sustained Non-Hertzian Longitudinal Wave Oscillations as a Rigorous Solution of Maxwell's Equations for Electromagnetic Radiation". Inventek Enterprises, Inc., Las Vegas, Nevada.
• Bieniosek, F. M., "Triple Resonance Pulse Transformer Circuit". Review of Scientific Instruments, 61 (6).
• Corum, J. F., and K. L. Corum, "Disclosure Concerning the Operation of an ELF Oscillator". CPG Communications, Inc., Newbury, Ohio.
• Corum, J. F., and K. L. Corum, "A Physical Interpretation of the Colorado Springs Data". CPG Communications, Inc., Newbury, Ohio.
• Corum, J. F., and K. L. Corum, "Tesla's Colorado Spring Receivers (A Short Introduction)". 2003.
• Corum, J. F., and K. L. Corum, "RF Coils, Helical Resonators and Voltage Magnification by Coherent Spatial Modes". IEEE, 2001.
• de Queiroz, Antonio Carlos M., "Synthesis of Multiple Resonance Networks". Universidade Federal do Rio de Janerio, Brazil. EE/COPE.
• de Queiroz, Antonio Carlos M., "Designing a Tesla Magnifier". Universidade Federal do Rio de Janerio, Brazil. EE/COPE.
• Grotz, Toby, "Wireless Transmission of Power: An Attempt to Verify Nikola Tesla's 1899 Colorado Springs Experiment, Results of Research and Experimentation". TESLA, Inc., Craig Colorado.
• Hartley, R. V. L., "Oscillations with Non-linear Reactances". Bell Systems Technical Journal, Sun Publishing. 1992.
• Wait, James, R., "Electromagnetic Waves in Stratified Media". Pergammon Press, 1972. (2nd edition)

Patents

• Armstrong, E. H., Template:US patent, "Wireless receiving system". 1914.
• Armstrong, E. H., Template:US patent, "Method of receiving high frequency oscillation". 1922.
• Armstrong, E. H., Template:US patent, "Signalling system". 1922.
• Fessenden, R. A., Template:US patent, "Signalling by sound and other longitudal elastic impulses". 1914.
• Leydorf, G. F., Template:US patent, "Antenna near field coupling system". 1966.
• Tanner, R. L., Template:US patent, "Extremely low-frequency antenna". 1965.
• Eastlund, Bernard J., Template:US patent, "Method for producing a shell of relativistic particles at an altitude above the earths surface". 1991.

See also

• Longitudinal waves
• Cavity resonators
• Telluric currents
• Knob Hill
• List of articles related to Nikola Tesla

External Links and resources

• Tesla Technology Research (http://www.ttr.com/) - Tesla Coils and the Failure of Lumped-Element Circuit Theory (http://www.ttr.com/corum/)
• Jean-Louis Naudin's Magnifying Transmitter (http://jnaudin.free.fr/html/tmt.htm)
• Practical Magnifier Construction Principles : Making it work (http://f3wm.free.fr/tesla/magnifier.html)
• The Real Science of "Non-Hertzian" Waves (http://205.243.100.155/frames/Non-Herzian_Waves.html) (This essay does not concentrate on longitudinal waves nor telluric currents, it's does focus on transverse waves)
• Cooper, John. F., "Magnifying Transmitter circuit diagram (http://www.tesla-coil.com/images/Magnifier%201.jpg); alternate circuit diagram (http://www.tesla-coil.com/images/Magnifier%202.jpg)". Tesla-Coil.com (http://www.Tesla-Coil.com).

References

[1] - My Inventions: The Autobiography of Nikola Tesla, Hart Brothers, 1982, Ch. 5, ISBN 0910077002

[2] - Nikola Tesla : Guided Weapons & Computer Technology, Leland I. Anderson, Twenty First Century Books, 1998, pp. 12-13, ISBN 0963601296.

[3] - Anderson, Leland I., "Nikola Tesla on his work with alternating currents and thier appliaction to wireless telegraphy, telephony, and transmission of power". Twenty First Century Books, 2002, pp. 74, 89-90, 107, 111, ISBN 1893817016.

[4] - Apparatus for Transmission of Electrical Energy, U.S. Patent No. 649,621, May 15, 1900

[5] - Apparatus for Transmitting Electrical Energy, Jan. 18, 1902, U.S. Patent 1,119,732, Dec. 1, 1914

[6] - Tesla, Nikola, "Colorado Springs Notes", 1899-1900, Nikola Tesla Museum, Beograd, 1978.

[7] - Valone, Thomas, "Harnessing the Wheelwork of Nature". ISBN 1-931882-04-5