EEVblog Electronics Community Forum
General => General Technical Chat => Topic started by: Sionyn on February 01, 2013, 11:08:44 pm
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So i was watching a program on discovery science called dark matters gritty boring for the most part, its about the dark uses of science seems a bit woo woo and anti science so i had enough of it.
Then it got interesting talking about Tesla i just had to see what evil things they try to eluded Tesla did. They started to talk about his tower.
Wardenclyffe Tower (1901–1917) also known as the Tesla Tower, was an early wireless transmission tower designed by Nikola Tesla and intended for commercial trans-Atlantic wireless telephony, broadcasting, and proof-of-concept demonstrations of wireless power transmission. It was never fully operational,]and the tower was demolished in 1917.
In a nutshell, the Tunguska explosion was thought to be a meteor that exploded before it hit the ground. And yet, It's 7:17 AM on the morning of June 30, 1908, the exact moment when Nikola Tesla is testing his "Death Ray" by aiming his beam towards the Arctic Circle where he hopes Admiral Peary will see a visual display in the sky. In a small Siberian village, herders of Reindeer are awakened by a huge ball of light, followed by an enormous explosion. Seismic vibrations were recorded by sensitive instruments as much as 1000 km (600 mi) away. At 500 km (300 mi), observers reported "deafening bangs" and a fiery cloud on the horizon.
So The Tunguska explosion was it the old pigeon fanciers fault ?
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So The Tunguska explosion was it the old pigeon fanciers fault ?
Hmm let me see.....
Entirely plausible meteorite event, or ridicuous 'death ray machine' for which there is no evidence of its existence or practicality
:-//
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completely unrelated and a coincidence, his tower was ripped down as fear it could be used as a weapon
i am sceptical of it too i wonder if any one knows were this conspiracy theory came from ?
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Huh?
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Most likely debris from a comet tail, away from the coma. Tesla has some nice bifillar coils, two coils in one.
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I'm pretty sure that if Tesla had any kind of even semi-practical death ray the US government would be on to it. Probably would have put nuclear weapons on the back burner and used the death ray instead.
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You do realize that Discovery, History et. all all quite literally the equivalent of tabloids, right? Just because they say something is supporting evidence doesn't mean that they are actually telling the truth, or even care. It's just what ever will one up the last show.
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So The Tunguska explosion was it the old pigeon fanciers fault ?
No.
Correlation does not equal causation. Especially when there is an infinitely more plausible explanation.
Dave.
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well i suppose its to be expected of the discovery channel these days, maybe a rename is order the conspiracy channel
sagen did a piece on this
The Mysterious Tunguska Event (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=irVof7adq4s#ws)
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completely unrelated and a coincidence, his tower was ripped down as fear it could be used as a weapon
i am sceptical of it too i wonder if any one knows were this conspiracy theory came from ?
The tower was taken down by the backers to try to regain some of the money spent. It contained a lot of steel and metal that was sold as scrap.
Unfortunately the Tesla tower device would not have worked as intended, the plans are easy to get online and many engineers and physicist have gone over them and found that while it might appear to work at first glance it has a lot of flaws, a major one being that it relied on a perfect ground with the earth and that isn't possible.
Tesla made a lot of great devices but what people fail to realize is that he also made a lot of things that didn't work. Like any inventor Tesla had a lot of prototypes that later became working devices but the tower is one that was in its 'alpha' stage and would have cost lots more money before it would be determined that it couldn't work.
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"It's 7:17 AM on the morning of June 30, 1908, the exact moment when Nikola Tesla is testing his "Death Ray" by aiming his beam towards the Arctic Circle where he hopes Admiral Peary will see a visual display in the sky."
Everything I've read on the Wardenclyffe Tower says Tesla's financial backers pulled out well before he had completed the equipment installation. I don't think I've even seen a photo of it with the metal cladding on the top dome complete.
Also it wasn't by any stretch intended to 'beam' anything. What information remains, suggests he intended to produce a ground-ionosphere standing wave world-wide. Unless there was some exotic physics Tesla had discovered that we still don't know about (which is actually a possibility, given some things he said and did.)
<googles....>
Huh. Well, that's actually rather interesting. I've been collecting Tesla legend for years, but have never seen this Tesla-Tunguska idea before. But now there's a lot of it about.
One point - no one is suggesting it was his Wardenclyffe tower that caused it. Just that Tesla and "his associate George Scherff" climbed to the top of the tower and used something else Tesla had built, from that vantage point. For example see here:
http://www.world-mysteries.com/sci_tesla1.htm (http://www.world-mysteries.com/sci_tesla1.htm)
Lots of stuff exists on Tesla's claims to have a 'beam weapon'. Too much to cover here.
Another interesting thing - you know who 'George Scherff' is claimed to have been?
Google tesla bush scherff for some fascinating reading. True? F-d if I know. Curious old photos...
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A comet, not a meteor. A meteor would have left an impact crater.
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sagen
Dude.
Skeptoid recently did a decent episode on the cult of Tesla (http://skeptoid.com/episodes/4345).
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A comet, not a meteor. A meteor would have left an impact crater.
Definitely not a comet. If a comet impacted the earth it would probably wipe out all life on the planet.
Technically a meteor is the visible trail of a falling meteoroid. Any part which reaches the ground is a meteorite.
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Definitely not a comet. If a comet impacted the earth it would probably wipe out all life on the planet.
No, definitely a comet. A comet is ice and dust. Basically a dirty snowball. A meteor is rock. A comet hitting the earth would do exactly what happened...ignite the local area from all the friction heat it built up entering the atmosphere and leave no impact crater. Comets have little mass for their size. Also, we're talking about a small comet here. Watch the Sagan video.
A meteor of the same size would have caused much more harm. It is a meteor/asteroid that caused a huge percentage of life to go extinct when it killed of the dinosaurs, not a comet.
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Definitely not a comet. If a comet impacted the earth it would probably wipe out all life on the planet.
No, definitely a comet. A comet is ice and dust. Basically a dirty snowball. A meteor is rock. A comet hitting the earth would do exactly what happened...ignite the local area from all the friction heat it built up entering the atmosphere and leave no impact crater. Comets have little mass for their size. Also, we're talking about a small comet here. Watch the Sagan video.
A meteor of the same size would have caused much more harm. It is a meteor/asteroid that caused a huge percentage of life to go extinct when it killed of the dinosaurs, not a comet.
OK, I haven't seen the Sagan video and wasn't aware that such small comets existed. 'Normal' comets, visible in the night sky, are asteroid sized. They may be 'dirty snowballs', but an average-sized comet has a mass in the billions of tonnes. If one of those hit the earth I don't think we'd be around for very long.
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asteroid sized
There is no clear upper or lower limit to the size of an asteroid. An asteroid's diameter can vary from tens of meters to that of something that could arguably be called a dwarf planet. Their composition also varies from loose rubble to rock (of many types) to iron.
Calling something "asteroid sized" is a bit pointless.
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OK, I haven't seen the Sagan video and wasn't aware that such small comets existed. 'Normal' comets, visible in the night sky, are asteroid sized. They may be 'dirty snowballs', but an average-sized comet has a mass in the billions of tonnes. If one of those hit the earth I don't think we'd be around for very long.
Comets can indeed be quite large. What Sagan et. al. suggest is a piece of a comet, which is feasible since comets - not being made of rock - can and do break up easily. In fact, I think the Shoemaker-Levy comet that struck Jupiter years ago broke up in its approach.
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OK, I haven't seen the Sagan video and wasn't aware that such small comets existed. 'Normal' comets, visible in the night sky, are asteroid sized. They may be 'dirty snowballs', but an average-sized comet has a mass in the billions of tonnes. If one of those hit the earth I don't think we'd be around for very long.
Comets are low mass objects mostly made of water and other frozen stuff, and range from tens of meters to a few tens of km in diameter by classification, not nearly as big as asteroids can get . Due to their low mass and density, the lose stuff and ice vaporises when comets hit the atmosphere, so you get big air blasts exactly like at Tunguska.
Dave.
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Comets are a class of asteroid. Asteroids are just clumps of rock, whether water ice, methane ice, other gas ice ( or at least gas at STP), metal, carbon compounds or metal oxides or carbonates, mostly a mix of all of the above in a clump that ranges from a dust size to dwarf planetoid.
Comets are just ones with a higher proportion of volatiles, and which are in either an elliptical, hyperbolic or other orbit that takes them close to the sun ( or into the atmosphere for many) such that they vaporise material off, which then creates a cloud of particles ( visible is mostly dust) that reflect sunlight.
Anything that enters the atmosphere of earth is a meteor, it just depends on what they are made of, and how big they are, as to whether they leave a hole if they hit the ground. Take a magnet, and wrap it in plastic, then place under a roof downpipe and see the metal particles you collect after a rainfall washes the roof clean. A large portion of them are meteoric iron from small particles that enter the atmosphere every day, and which are so small that they do not burn up but land on the surface almost evenly, just a little heated but otherwise nearly undamaged.
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Comets are a class of asteroid.
I respectfully point out the following...
First line of the wikipedia entry for "asteroid":
"Asteroids are small Solar System bodies that are not comets"
Third paragraph of the wikipedia entry for "comet":
"Comets are distinguished from asteroids by the presence of a coma or a tail. However, extinct comets that have passed close to the Sun many times have lost nearly all of their volatile ices and dust and may come to resemble small asteroids.[3] Asteroids are thought to have a different origin from comets, having formed inside the orbit of Jupiter rather than in the outer Solar System.[4][5] The discovery of main-belt comets and active centaurs has blurred the distinction between asteroids and comets (see asteroid terminology)."
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It's really a bummer when a subject with some possibilities of good info fall to the bs of semantics :(
The semantics may have there own value , but not when they take away from the original subject .
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I was hoping not to kill the discussion , but just get it back to Tesla ?? :)
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I was hoping not to kill the discussion , but just get it back to Tesla ?? :)
Sure. I believe that Tesla did not cause the event. This is my explanation of the origins of the story:
There seems to be a growing cult around Tesla, giving him credit for free energy devices, earthquake machines, meteor/comet/something strikes, aura enhancers and pretty much everything that would have made the world a more interesting place, soon probably including candy, sugar and spice.
I agree that Tesla was a brilliant person, with amazing inventions and I do not by any way wish to belittle his REAL achievements, but the current trend is that everyone who failed to write a successful book on conspiracies is going into the "write something amazing involving Tesla (truth is optional) and sell it" market or the good old "Slap Tesla's name on it, it'll sell like crazy to the esoteric nuts!".
Fine examples of this include:
http://books.google.sk/books/about/The_Fantastic_Inventions_of_Nikola_Tesla.html?id=fXB0fm-QqLMC&redir_esc=y (http://books.google.sk/books/about/The_Fantastic_Inventions_of_Nikola_Tesla.html?id=fXB0fm-QqLMC&redir_esc=y)
or http://www.lifetechnology.org/teslashield.htm (http://www.lifetechnology.org/teslashield.htm)
(there's a lot more where that came from!)
What happens is that every time someone publishes something like this, a small part of it is circled around as rumor, and a few years later, when the origins of it are forgotten, it's considered general knowledge or a fact-ish fact, which is not in the text books because the governments suppressed it. And have been sitting on it doing nothing with it for a over half a century.
David
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What happens is that every time someone publishes something like this, a small part of it is circled around as rumor, and a few years later, when the origins of it are forgotten, it's considered general knowledge or a fact-ish fact, which is not in the text books because the governments suppressed it.
Yes, this is true and really annoying, for those like me who like to learn about things Tesla actually did and said.
I agree the Tunguska explosion had nothing to do with Tesla, and the stories claiming that are just made-up rubbish. For one thing, they commonly refer to a 'beam' (see the link I posted before.) But unless this was a beam that followed the Earth's curvature (how?) the idea is ridiculous. See image below, I shopped up from google Earth showing locations of Tunguska explosion, and the Wardenclyffe Tower. What, the beam (that disintegrated a bird, they claim) went through more than a third the Earth's diameter with no effect, then emerged to cause the explosion? But if we assume such a strangely acting beam could exist (I'd contemplate this only because of the 'Scalar Wave' pseudo-science stuff), then WHY climb the tower to launch it? If it's going to go through 1/3 of the planet with no effect, then firing from ground level should be fine, you'd think. Oh, and pretty accurate 'ranging', to achieve an explosion a few Km up in the atmosphere on nearly the other side of the globe. Considering that he was supposedly way off in his pointing accuracy.
It's just silly. The only remarkable thing here is that anyone would claim this. Especially given that the Tunguska site has at least two solidly established impact craters of fragments of the space object that caused the airburst. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tunguska_event (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tunguska_event)
Anyway, back to real events. Here's some Wardenclyffe Tower timeline, from http://www.teslauniverse.com/nikola-tesla-timeline (http://www.teslauniverse.com/nikola-tesla-timeline)
Year: 1901
December, 11th: Tower Construction Begins
Construction finally begins for Tesla's most ambitious project, The World-Wide Wireless System known as Wardenclyffe Tower.
Year: 1903
July, 15th: Wardenclyffe Testing Begins
"The New York Sun" reported the strange goings-on at Tesla's transmitter. It stated, "all sorts of lightning were flashed from the tall tower and poles," and "the air was filled with blinding streaks of electricity which seemed to shoot off into the darkness on some mysterious errand."
Year: 1906
Wardenclyffe Workers Laid Off
Tesla made great efforts to obtain funding for the Wardenclyffe project after J.P. Morgan withdrew his support, but was unsuccessful. Unable to pay his employees, he was forced to lay them off and construction of the tower ceases.
Year: 1912
April, 14th: John Jacob Astor Dies
John Jacob Astor was Tesla's wealthiest and most generous investor. He invested $100,000 in 1899 for Tesla to, as he understood it, further develop and produce a new lighting system. Tesla instead, used the money to fund his Colorado Springs experiments. Mr. Astor was understandably unhappy with Tesla's deception and avoided him for several years. They did later reconcile and worked together on aircraft and propulsion systems in 1908. Unfortunately, Mr. Astor and his wife were aboard the "Titanic" which began to sink after colliding with an iceberg. Mr. Astor was able to help his wife into a lifeboat but was unable to join her. His body was found a few days later and is buried in Trinity Church Cemetery in New York City."
Tower Equipment Repossessed
Westhinghouse, Church, Kerr & Company removed the machinery from the building, as part of their judgment of $23,500.
Year: 1915
Wardenclyffe Deed Surrendered
In order to keep a roof over his head, Tesla had given two mortgages on Wardenclyffe to George C. Boldt, proprietor of the Waldorf-Astoria, to secure payment of hotel bills amounting to almost $19,000.00. Tesla requested that they not be recorded, fearing that all his projects would be destroyed if the matter became public. He was unable to make any payments at all, and was forced to sign the deed over to Waldorf-Astoria, Inc., through a silent intermediary.
Year: 1916
Tesla Declares Bankruptcy
Even though Tesla had some minor successes, he continued to fall deeper and deeper into debt primarily due to his high overhead. He was called into the state supreme court for $935.00 in unpaid taxes on the Wardenclyffe property. Under oath before Justice Finch, Tesla revealed that he was essentially penniless and owned no real assets. "New York World" ran an embarrassing article exposing Tesla's financial crisis.
Year: 1917
July, 4th: Wardenclyffe Tower Destroyed
Reported in the media as being suspected of being used by German spies, the tower was actually ordered to be destroyed to cover debts incurred by Tesla at the Waldorf Astoria where he lived for almost 20 years.
Year: 1943
January, 7th: Tesla Dies At 86
Tesla died quietly and alone in room #3327 on the 33rd floor of the Hotel New Yorker in New York City. The coroner would later estimate the time of death at 22:30 EST. Tesla was 86 years old.
January, 8th: Maid Finds Tesla Dead
Tesla had placed a "do not disturb" sign on his door on January 5th, 1943. Ignoring the sign, maid Alice Monaghan entered the room to find Tesla dead in his bed. Assistant Medical Examiner H. W. Wembly was called to the scene and after examination of the body, gave his opinion that the cause of death had been coronary thrombosis and that there had been no suspicious circumstances. Tesla's body was taken to the Frank E. Campbell Funeral Home at Madison Ave. and 81st St. A sculptor was commissioned by Hugo Gernsback, a long-time friend and supporter of Tesla, to create a death mask which is now displayed in the Nikola Tesla Museum.
January, 9th: OAP Seizes Tesla Estate
After learning of Tesla's death, the FBI ordered the U.S. Office of Alien Property to seize all of Tesla's belongings. Tesla's entire estate from the Hotel New Yorker, and other New York City hotels, was transported to the Manhattan Storage and Warehouse Company under OAP seal. Dr. John G. Trump, an electrical engineer with the National Defense Research Committee of the Office of Scientific Research and Development, was called in to analyze the Tesla items in OAP custody.
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One of the best ways to learn about Tesla is to read his patents. You can really begin to understand his thought process by reading the patents in the order they were filed not the order the patents were granted.
http://www.teslauniverse.com/nikola-tesla-patents?PHPSESSID=e4a3a283f200e691fab3c096a0ec0459; (http://www.teslauniverse.com/nikola-tesla-patents?PHPSESSID=e4a3a283f200e691fab3c096a0ec0459;)
One of my favorites is the - thermal motor.
http://www.teslauniverse.com/nikola-tesla-patents-396,121-thermo-magnetic-motor (http://www.teslauniverse.com/nikola-tesla-patents-396,121-thermo-magnetic-motor)
Another one I never would have thought of, converting AC to DC with just wire, no semiconductors needed.
http://www.teslauniverse.com/nikola-tesla-patents-413,353-direct-from-alternating-currents (http://www.teslauniverse.com/nikola-tesla-patents-413,353-direct-from-alternating-currents)