Shaun "where's my ride" Cassidy

[YiamCross]

We must assume that his council accommodation has modern electrics. Meaning that an RCD will intervene before he collects a Darwin award.

It's an induction coil strapped to big old capacitors, all that juicy electrikery is there waiting to be unleashed on the wrong side of any protective fuses or cutouts. That's why capacitors are so dangerous.

[Hyrion]

RCD's can fail

Let's hope not, if only for the sake of any neighbors living in immediate attached accommodations.

While I get a chuckle at OPCAs harming themselves, I don't find them harming innocent bystanders amusing.

[YiamCross]

Actually the chances of Master Cassidy harming himself are pretty slim, I doubt he's got the dosh to advance much further than his pvc wrapped extra long toilet tube. I doubt he'll even get the dosh to buy a toaster to connect it to so he can set fire to it. He is an idiot but I don't think he deserves to be fried for it. Trouble is you can't protect idiots from themselves no matter how hard you try some times.

[morrand]

We must assume that his council accommodation has modern electrics. Meaning that an RCD will intervene before he collects a Darwin award.

It's actually not likely that it would, since (if the Tesla coil is built in the usual way), Shaun would look just like any other load to the RCD.

All joking aside, I really, really hope that Shaun is not so far out there that he'd try to put a Tesla coil in a cardboard box and plug it into the wall in an attempt to get free heat, free energy, or free anything else. I really hope he leaves Tesla coils alone altogether. He should try for a Van de Graaf generator, or a Wimshurst machine, or something like that. That's more mad-sciencey, anyway.

[grixit]

Madder still, lets see him build a strandbeast.

[notorial dissent]

We must assume that his council accommodation has modern electrics. Meaning that an RCD will intervene before he collects a Darwin award.

It's an induction coil strapped to big old capacitors, all that juicy electrikery is there waiting to be unleashed on the wrong side of any protective fuses or cutouts. That's why capacitors are so dangerous.

Which is why idiots shouldn't play with things like this. Although he may just be dumb enough to get it hooked up to the point it blows the circuit and fries itself and then no more worries. Sometimes stupid and incompetent is a safety mechanism, but not usually.

[FatGambit]

I assume he realises a Tesla coil doesn't ever 'create' energy, it just converts it and always needs a source to charge from? I'm not really sure why there's all this fuss over getting 'free energy' from a Tesla coil, someone care to explain?

[notorial dissent]

I assume he realises a Tesla coil doesn't ever 'create' energy, it just converts it and always needs a source to charge from? I'm not really sure why there's all this fuss over getting 'free energy' from a Tesla coil, someone care to explain?

That's the whole point, he doesn't. He thinks he's going to get something for nothing since he doesn't even remotely understand what he is playing with, it is all magic to him. If you really wanted to get on a platform and rant you could go on about failures of the educational system, but I don't think that is the cause, I think it is far simpler than that, he's just plain mind numbingly ignorant as well as incredibly stupid, and will believe anything, no matter how ridiculous, as long as it comes from an alternative source. He's an idiot.

[PeanutGallery]

I assume he realises a Tesla coil doesn't ever 'create' energy, it just converts it and always needs a source to charge from? I'm not really sure why there's all this fuss over getting 'free energy' from a Tesla coil, someone care to explain?

I believe it's linked to what is believed to be one of the great projects Tesla was working on before he died. Tesla envisaged a system that could be used to power and transmit information around the world. Somewhere within the Freeosphere it's become corrupted to mean that Tesla would have sent all this electricity for free, in part this was true, he did want to send electricity to underdeveloped areas of the world and also bring better systems of communication between nations. However while he would have sent energy to the underdeveloped nations, it's uncertain if he would have charged for this. I suspect that he would have, although he may have only charged enough to cover the costs of generating the power. It's a moot argument however because we don't know if he would have, simply because Tesla's system never got off the ground.

Tesla's own reports on his experiments in this area are limited, they don't provide any examples of success (Tesla normally kept meticulous notes) and he never demonstrated the system successfully (even though he claimed to have done so in legal papers the veracity of the claim is questionable).

It's described here. The planned method for power transmission is believed to have been impossible. However in part, albeit through Radio waves and not power we do have wireless access to the internet and recent reports have indicated that Facebook is planning to use solar powered drone aircraft to act as global wifi hotspots that should give access to the internet from anywhere on the planet.

It is perhaps ironic that what Tesla envisaged is in part a reality for us, however it makes use of a system of transmission Tesla rubbished as being "one of the most remarkable and inexplicable aberrations of the scientific mind which has ever been recorded in history."

[YiamCross]

I assume he realises a Tesla coil doesn't ever 'create' energy, it just converts it and always needs a source to charge from? I'm not really sure why there's all this fuss over getting 'free energy' from a Tesla coil, someone care to explain?

I think, from the detailed and comprehensive diagrams of Master Cassidy that the heart of his system is an array of magnets which will, when magically tuned, turn a motor which will then drive the heat particle accelerator. It's simple really, opposite poles of magnets repel each other so all you have to do is put magnets on a rotor and a stator and "tune" them so they repel each other and the motor runs with no input. Simples. At least I t hink that's what he's planning so it's unlikely he'd get involved with coils and capacitors or even the mains. Hopefully.

[FatGambit]

Yeah I know what you're describing Yiam but that's not the coil i think he's wanting to build (well going off the descriptions here, that's not in the slightest a tesla coil) being the son of a sparky i find this subject fascinating and usually end up building them just for shits and giggles, the closest i ever got was building somthing similar to what you describe using magnetics to turn a wheel which was fixed to a motor which generated electricity, technically free electricity, however the timing was a bugger (the pusher magnet can't be facing the pushed magnets while they approach otherwise it stops the wheel) and assuming anybody could actually work out a way to overcome that, the amount of amps generated were so minimal they wouldn't even run a remote control let alone a TV

But hey at least sovcity is keping the electronics industry alive

[slowsmile]

I assume he realises a Tesla coil doesn't ever 'create' energy, it just converts it and always needs a source to charge from? I'm not really sure why there's all this fuss over getting 'free energy' from a Tesla coil, someone care to explain?

I believe it's linked to what is believed to be one of the great projects Tesla was working on before he died. Tesla envisaged a system that could be used to power and transmit information around the world. Somewhere within the Freeosphere it's become corrupted to mean that Tesla would have sent all this electricity for free.

It's part of a conspiracy theory that Tesla had developed "free energy" but teh eebil gubmint suppressed his work so their puppetmasters in the power industry / banksters (ie the joos) could fleece us all- oh and in some versions they had Tesla murdered just to be on the safe side.

[NYGman]

I thought the whole thing with Tesla was the Wireless distribution of Electric. He sends Electric out into the Atmosphere, and we can pick it up and use it. Not sure how he expected to charge for it, but we do in fact have something like this today that is being worked on. There are some scientists who are "harvisting" the existing energy in radio waves that are contently pounding us. Think WiFi, radio waves, Cell Phones. These radio waves can be captured and turned in to free energy. Currently they do not generate much energy, a few mA's, but that is enough for small electronic devices. So in a way, you can harvest free energy from unseen radio waves, but you are really just a Parasite, sucking the energy out of someone else waves..

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/n ... uture.html

[YiamCross]

I thought the whole thing with Tesla was the Wireless distribution of Electric. He sends Electric out into the Atmosphere, and we can pick it up and use it. Not sure how he expected to charge for it, but we do in fact have something like this today that is being worked on. There are some scientists who are "harvisting" the existing energy in radio waves that are contently pounding us. Think WiFi, radio waves, Cell Phones. These radio waves can be captured and turned in to free energy. Currently they do not generate much energy, a few mA's, but that is enough for small electronic devices. So in a way, you can harvest free energy from unseen radio waves, but you are really just a Parasite, sucking the energy out of someone else waves..

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/n ... uture.html

Like all these things, it's hard to know what was really going on with Tesla. I watched that "documentary" on Netflix but when they talked about Tesla stepping up a few thousand amps to hundreds of thousands of volts I decided it wasn't what one would call a quality bit of research (Amps is Amps and don't get stepped up, down or sideways into Volts any more than apples get converted to oranges no matter what you do to them). One reasonable assumption to make, though, was that Tesla saw the potential energy released by the water tumbling over Niagra Falls as a source of free energy if converted to electricity.

Like our friend Hyron and all the OPCA idiots who think sunlight and wind and water are all free they make the mistake of forgetting to count the cost of the machinery required to convert that free resource into something useful along with the cost of delivering to wherever it's needed when it's needed. Those bloody great AC generators and water turbines did not appear by magic for no cost, nor did the distribution system needed to deliver electricity to the end user.

Idiots lacking the brains to think critically or understand enough about science and technology to render them able to tie their own shoe laces somehow conflate different areas of his work and come up with free energy from Tesla coils. Which, as has been pointed out above, were intended as a means of transmitting energy through the ether without wires or pipes. The problem is that sending large amounts of energy through the air as some sort of wave has consequences aside from not being free. Look at the humble microwave oven. Plenty of energy transmitted through the air there but you wouldn't want to be in the way of it. The basic problem is that the cost of running your hi-fi without wires would be par-boiled internal organs. The bloke who came up with the idea of heating with microwaves got it when he noticed a bar of chocolate in his pocket melted when he was close to a powerful radio transmitter. Nothing is for nothing.

One thing in that Tesla documentary I'd forgotten about and find particularly distressing is the electrocution of an elephant by Edison in an attempt to prove that AC was dangerous. For some reason it never fails to amaze me what depths some people will descend to in order to prove a point.

[Dr. Caligari]

I'd forgotten about and find particularly distressing is the electrocution of an elephant by Edison in an attempt to prove that AC was dangerous

Edison's electrocution of an elephant didn't put Tesla out of business, as he had hoped, but it did give the State of New York an idea for a replacement for hanging.

[NYGman]

I'd forgotten about and find particularly distressing is the electrocution of an elephant by Edison in an attempt to prove that AC was dangerous

Edison's electrocution of an elephant didn't put Tesla out of business, as he had hoped, but it did give the State of New York an idea for a replacement for hanging.

Not quite right. Edison was a proponent of DC. He had Hired Tesler to help him develop this. Tesler recommended AC, and Edison didn't agree. Tesla left over this, and money, as he felt he wasn't compensated for his work by Edison. Basically he believed Edison promised to reward him for his work, but Edison didn't. Edison only developed the Electric chair to cast AC in a bad light, he was actually against capital punishment, but involved himself in the Chair, to cast a bad light on AC Electricity, championed by Westinghouse, who had I believe started to work with Tesla. Edison wanted to associate AC with Death. He wanted an electrocution to be known as Westinghousing (Or something close to that, going on memory here).

Edison designed the Chair, and while it did ultimately work when used the first time, The very first attempt failed and the guy was left alive. The second shock killed him, but due to recharging the voltage, this took a long time, and the suffering of the guy really impacted those watching.

Anyway, the elephant came in later, and it was another public Edison test at Coney Island, electrocuting an Elephant who had killed a few men. This test went well, many witnessed the event. However, this was actually Edison V. Westinghouse, not really Edison V. Tesler. It was done to show AC was Dangerous, and to try to associate AC with Death, to champion DC.

We all know how this ends, as we use AC today, and at the end, even Edison admitted AC was better than DC, he just didn't come up with it

[Hyrion]

Like our friend Hyron ... they make the mistake of forgetting to count the cost of the machinery required to convert that free resource into something useful along with the cost of delivering to wherever it's needed when it's needed.

... it [a solar panel array] rang in around the $36,000
...
And depending where you draw the line with regards how much battery storage you can be looking at anywhere from $5k to an equivalent cost to what you paid for the array.

You may not agree with my various opinions. I can easily live with that. However, if you review my posts you will clearly see that I'm presenting very real data showing that I have indeed considered various costs.

I've also clearly clarified that I was speaking from the perspective of a consumer putting up a solar array for his own use while you were speaking from the perspective of a business distributing said energy.

So... correct me

When I put in a solar array to power my own home and I'm absolutely not concerned with powering my neighbors home:

• What "cost of delivering to wherever it's needed" have I overlooked?

In the alternative, I'd appreciate if you didn't read more into the opinions I voice then I've expressed.

Those bloody great AC generators and water turbines did not appear by magic for no cost

I never said they did - but if you believe otherwise, I expect you to identify specifically where I've said that.

... nor did the distribution system needed to deliver electricity to the end user ...

Again: I expect you to identify where I stated that.

If you can not find such statements by me, then I think it would be appropriate for you to apologize for grouping me in with individuals who do state such things.

On the other hand, if you can clearly point out where I did state such things, then I will offer up my own apology as well as clarify what I truly intended to state but obviously expressed very badly.

[Burnaby49]

We're getting into a topic, and an argument, that have absolutely nothing at all to do with Quatloos. If you feel the need to continue it please do so through PMs.

[Hyrion]

We're getting into a topic, and an argument, that have absolutely nothing at all to do with Quatloos. If you feel the need to continue it please do so through PMs.

The only reason I spoke up was because YiamCross attributed - in a public post - expressions of opinion which I have not expressed.

If he's willing to delete my name from that context of his post - I'm willing to delete my previous post as well as this one.

If someone claims I've said something in a public post then it is unfair not to allow me to respond in order to correct the public position. I've been assaulted in the past because someone has claimed I've said things I did not - so I'm rather sensitive with anyone claiming I've said things I haven't.

Personally, I'd rather he had continued expressing his opinions without directly including me and I'd not have said anything.

[Joinder]

We're getting into a topic, and an argument, that have absolutely nothing at all to do with Quatloos. If you feel the need to continue it please do so through PMs.

Well said, glad to see you moderators are on the ball, even if you've slept thru reams of this guff.