Re: [TCML] Extrodinarily Rudimentary Question From Newbiest Naif

[nickobert testein <nickobert.testein@xxxxxxxxx>]

Hey Carl,

I still think the number of sky terminating arcs will vary in number
throughout the day. I'll find a coil out here in California and put
the theory to test. Also, you mentioned "This process is exactly the
same as lightning propagation, except that lightning is not
oscillatory"; I don't want to sound combative or anything but
lightning IS oscillatory. That's been understood in meteorology for
almost twenty years.

I'll see what I can do regarding this experiment. If anyone is near
the bay area I'd love to hear from them.

Thanks
Jeffrey


Hi Jim, sorry about the ending of the last email, I hit send before
finishing. The youtube link are a couple clips of mine.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ft4mKcWdQWk

Its interesting you mentioning lightning because atmospheric
electricity is closer to my knowledge base than artificially produced
currents. I have been researching static fields, both environmentally
and artificially produced and I wrote because coming from a geophysics
point of view, the arc would appear to be arcing to the atmosphere
itself.

I wanted to ask this question to see if there were a consensus among
Tesla experts and if there wasn't, I wanted to propose a simple
experiment which should to illustrate the actual dynamics of a "sky
arc".

A Not sure how tight you are with geophysics but bear with me if its elementary.

What we call atmospheric electricity is also known as the potential
earth gradient (PEG). PEG is the potential electric field difference
which exists between the surface of the earth and the ionosphere. For
every foot nearly a hundred volts on average. During an approaching
storm it can be in the thousands.

To find out whether a Tesla coil is indeed arcing to the atmospheric
potential one could count the number of sky arcs over a given time,
then do the test again when then the atmospheric potential has been
altered. If the coil is arcing to the atmospheric potential then the
number of arcs would vary accordingly.

Fortunately, nature has made it quite simple since the field naturally
varies during the course of a day. These fluctuations could be taken
advantage of for this test. Finding these fluctuations can be made
quite simple with a fiber glass fishing rod and s couple pith balls.
Depending on the season and the weather, it would be quite easy to
observe the pith balls diverge to their furthest or closest and then
fire up the coil accordingly.

That is pretty much the experiment I have been planning to set up but
I don't have access to a coil.

Well that's the idea. If you're interested in what I do there are a
couple short
clips on you tube

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ft4mKcWdQWk

Thanks Again

Jeffrey


On Mon, Apr 11, 2011 at 7:52 AM, Carl Noggle <cn@xxxxx> wrote:
> Hi---
>
> Jim Lux's explanation is good.  The potential (voltage) of the toroid of a
> TC is a few hundred thousand volts, so the atmospheric potential gradient of
> 100 volts per meter or so has little influence.  Sparks don't jump to a
> potential, they jump to a charge, directed by the potential gradient.
>
> When the toroid is negative, it has an excess of electrons which are all
> pushing against each other.  This repulsion is what we see as voltage, and
> the gradient of this voltage is directed outward.  When the voltage becomes
> sufficiently high, electrons break free of the toroid and form a channel
> traveling outward from the toroid, following the voltage gradient (usually
> called the potential gradient).  The channel (called a leader) propagates
> because the electrons at the tip are pushed forward by the ones behind them.
>  As the leader travels, electrons are stored in the air around it, and when
> the toroid voltage drops to zero there is little impetus for the leader to
> go further.  It then goes out, but leaves behind a cloud of electrons where
> it traveled.  The path of the leader is heated from its passage, and so
> remains conducting for many microseconds.  During the next half-cycle the
> the toroid voltage becomes positive, and the same process happens, but this
> time the leader propagates along the heated path by pulling electrons back
> into the toroid.  This is a little harder to visualize than the negative
> case.  This process is exactly the same as lightning propagation, except
> that lightning is not oscillatory.
>
> The leader lights up because the potential gradient at the tip of the spark
> is very high and removes electrons from some of the atoms it encounters,
> leaving them ionized.  When the atoms reacquire their electrons, they emit
> light at frequencies determined by the type of atom.
>
> The currents in a propagating lightning leader are of the order of several
> hundred amps.  When the leader contacts the earth, a current of 20,000 amps
> or so travels in the channel which has been prepared.  This is the dazzling
> spark we see in cloud-to-ground lightning.  When we see "spider lightning"
> in the clouds, we are seeing the propagating leaders without the
> high-current flash.  When the TC spark contacts a grounded conductor, we get
> a similar much brighter spark along the leader path.  It would be fun and
> interesting to measure the currents in these two types of TC discharges.
>  But not easy.  My MicroCap circuit simulator says that the current in the
> propagating leaders should be about a half amp, but there are many aspects
> of reality that can't be put into a simulator.  The average current in the
> discharge is much lower due to the pulsed nature, but the half-amp explains
> why them suckers hurt so much.
>
> An excellent reference for lightning information of all types is "The
> Lightning Discharge," by Martin A. Uman.  Every TC dude who is even
> half-serious should have this book.  Earlier editions were published under
> the name "Lightning."  Good explanations of the atmospheric electric field
> and all aspects of lightning are given.
>
> There are many amazing videos of lightning leaders on Youtube taken by Tom
> Warner.  Check this one out and follow the links for many others.
>  Astonishing stuff.
>
>     http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A0XkNfTyR9A
>
> You can also check out his website at ztresearch.com.
>
> ---Carl
>
>
>
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