WIRELESS INVENTIONS.

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume XXXV, Issue 4740, 20 August 1924, Page 4

WIRELESS INVENTIONS.

LIGHT & POWER THE NEXT STEP. TESLA’S DISCOVERY. Now that science has succeeded in projecting the sounds o£ musical instruments and human voices through the ether the next step, according to Nicola Tesla, inventor and engineer, is to - broadcast electricity for illumination and power production. Proof that this new marvel is about to be realised is offered by Professor Tesla, in a New York “Evening Post” interview, in which he declares that overhead and underground wiring will become obsolete, All that the factory or householder need do will be to “tune in” and make use of electrical energy which may have been generated in a station distant hundreds or thousands of miles.

By closing a circuit between the etheric vibrations and the earth, which will require the use of a device perfected by Professor Teslg, energy will be released. The rays sent out into the air are negative and inoperative until' they ’are linked up by the consumer. Describing the principle involved, the’inventor likens the earth to a hollow reservoir into which water is' pumped’, Pressure will exist everywhere, yet no energy will be consumed. The moment this reserve is tapped the force of the pent-up water will be translated intp power. JUst' how this result will be brought about is Professor Teisla’s secret and the crux of his years of research in the-field of radiography. Discussing his- machine, the inventor says:

‘‘Since .my original experimental demonstrations I have made great improvements and can now definitely announce that the loss in transmission to the greatest-terrestrial distancesay 12,000 miles —will not amount io more than one-quarter of one per cent. This, of course, does not take into account certain unavoidable losses in the transmitter and receiver, which will amount to about four per cent, in the aggregate. In the present method of conveying energy through wires the loss is often as great as twenty per cent, or more, and the distances are limited.” Professor Tesla disclaims the use of Hertzian waves in accomplishing power transmission. True, he admits, “some kiifd of energy is radiated, but it is not in the form of transverse waves in the ether.” As an illustration :

“Suppose that two wires are led from a generator of alternating currents and use to light an incandescent lamp, at gome distance. If the alternations of the current are very slow there will be virtually no energy radiated from the conductors. Imagine, now, that the currents are made to pulsate faster and faster. Then, in the same measure, more and more of the so-called Hertz waves will be emitted and it .will be found that ever so much more power will be required to light the lamp. “But the lamp is operated only by

the currents which pass through the filament, and all the energy that is radiated in the form of ‘Hertzian waves is entirely lost and useless for the purpose.” The first departure made by Tesla in his investigations was to use one wire instead of two. Further work in this direction led to the idea of substituting the earth for the wire, and then the real work in the transmission of eilergy without wires began. He made the discovery that the planet responded’ to the currents • impressed upon it exactly as though it were completely insulated in space with • out any conducting envelope whatever. In other words, whatever be the electrical properties of the atmosphere at high altitudes, there was do heavyside layer, a name given to the outer gaseous envelope' of the earth, supposed to be rendered conductive through ionization, caused by the sun’s rays.

This discovery showed that the most complex and rapid electrical oscillations —human speech and and even power—could be transmitted through the earth far better than through any artificial cable or conductor Experiment proved this to be the case.

To demonstrate the practicability of his system his own laboratory, he says, is being lighted by vacuum tubes which epnsume little energy and are lacking all metal contacts. Plans are under .way for the construction of a power plant at Niagara. Looking forward to the future, the electrical wizard predicts that his device will be of inestimable service to the isolated community, adding that the operation of flying machines without fuel will assume international importance. Nikola Tesla has contributed largely to the science of electricity, his most heralded discovery being that of the quadruplex method of telegraphy, whereby several messages may be sent over a single wire simultaneously. Among his major inventions have been the introduction of the arc light (now largely superseded by the nitrogen lamp) ; the Tesla motor and system cf alternating power transmission , the Tesla coil, or transformer, and, lastly, the wireless power trasismittci, which has always been the chief objective of his scientific studies.