Discharge induced vortices / High Voltage / Forums

Forums

4hv.org :: Forums :: High Voltage

« Previous topic | Next topic »

Discharge induced vortices

1 2 next

Move Thread

LAN_403

Tesladownunder

Sun Jul 16 2006, 01:26AM

Registered Member #10 Joined: Thu Feb 02 2006, 09:45AM
Location: Bunbury, Australia
Posts: 1424

This continues from the previous thread from EVR about a water based discharge. It is appropriate that I start a new thread for experimental data of my own as the technique is quite different. I was withholding details until I could gauge some initial success and determine if this was new information.
Intro My inspiration came from watching detailed videos of a smoke ring in action demonstrating stable movement, small size and the ability to contain particles within the structure. I figured that this would be a good candidate for a ball lightning carrier. It can be easily generated by a pressure wave in a round structure.
My second "eureka" moment was the realisation that iron particles have a long and stable life once ignited. Witness the long constant intensity glow from molten globules in exploding wire or steel wool experiments. Potentially, combine the two and you could have a reasonable facsimile of ball lightning (BL).
Setup I have a steel discharge chamber with a hole in the top. Current from my cap bank at 4.5kV for 2kJ comes in from a heavily supported lead. I have in the shot below used some aluminium foil and some steel wool which will initiate the discharge.
Results the best shot to date is this one. It shows the big tongue of plasma shooting out with the vortex moving slower but still 25ft/sec (3 frames in 3 feet) and is just over 1 foot in diameter. The vortex appears to be smoke only and is not luminious. It does not appear to contain any of the iron particles.
Discussion Now that I have had time to read up on this it does seem that a favoured theory is indeed vortices formed after lightning strikes into sand forming silica/silicon as the luminous substance. I have demonstrated the vortex formed from an electrical discharge.
Conclusion A vortex induced by an electrical discharge is a candidate for the carrier of ball lightning.
References This article from Sierra.co summarises current theories well.

Peter

1153013182 10 FT0 Pulsecapballsmallclosed

1153013182 10 FT0 Pulsecapballalfe2kjsmallapvidbl1label

Photo above show the vortex (grey smoke ball near the shed light). This is moving upwards and you can see this in the video.
Click on the link below to play the WMV video loop. This really lets you see the vortex moving about 1 foot per frame.
]1153013182_10_FT0_ball_lightning_2.wmv[/ file]

ragnar

Sun Jul 16 2006, 02:25AM

Registered Member #63 Joined: Thu Feb 09 2006, 06:18AM
Location:
Posts: 1425

hi Peter, what happened to your 'nice' camera? Is this the same one you won?

Are you investigating more than just the carrier?

Bjørn

Sun Jul 16 2006, 02:37AM

Registered Member #27 Joined: Fri Feb 03 2006, 02:20AM
Location: Hyperborea
Posts: 2058

At least we now will have every UFO freak in the world finding the forum on Google.

Nik

Sun Jul 16 2006, 03:19AM

Registered Member #53 Joined: Thu Feb 09 2006, 04:31AM
Location: Ontario, Canada
Posts: 638

Givin the shape of your device I'm not suprised at all that you got a vortex from it. If you saw my thread in general chat, I built a smoke ring launcher that has pretty much the same shape. Your vortex launcher it just a little smaller and faster then mine.

Tesladownunder

Sun Jul 16 2006, 03:42AM

Registered Member #10 Joined: Thu Feb 02 2006, 09:45AM
Location: Bunbury, Australia
Posts: 1424

blackplasma wrote ...

hi Peter, what happened to your 'nice' camera? Is this the same one you won?
Are you investigating more than just the carrier?

Sadly, it was that camera. I forgot it was on when I changed lenses. I am investigating more than the carrier but it is a start....

BjÃ¸rn wrote ...

At least we now will have every UFO freak in the world finding the forum on Google.

Fortunately they have 15,100,000 other references to look at as well.

nik282000 wrote ...

Givin the shape of your device I'm not suprised at all that you got a vortex from it. If you saw my thread in general chat, I built a smoke ring launcher that has pretty much the same shape. Your vortex launcher it just a little smaller and faster then mine.

You have great smoke rings which I saw when I went to the attachments. I got the idea on a video by Stan Deyo who has become very free energy/alternative but he built the Tesla coil that ran for 20 years here in Perth that I upgraded a few years ago. It showed smoke rings for some alternative reason but with good detail. I wanted fast and concentrated because that is what the cap bank discharge is and I wanted it to move away from the flash. I was in the process of designing a 6 in barrel for slower discharges before I looked at the videos more closely.
I designed the outlet initially with half the diameter of the chamber and with sharp edges. I have shifted to a smaller one now.

The WMV video (250k) shows a vortex without the sparkles as it uses aluminium ignition only. There is a flash but it comes and goes between frames. I added talcum powder to add to the "smoke". Not sure if it made a difference. On a subsequent smilar shot I used strontium. Again I didn't capture the flash. It was windier and no vortex formed.

Peter
] 1153021355_10_FT13096_ball_lightning_talc_highres. wmv[/file]

Nik

Sun Jul 16 2006, 06:25AM

Registered Member #53 Joined: Thu Feb 09 2006, 04:31AM
Location: Ontario, Canada
Posts: 638

Getting any kind of plasma into the vortex will be pretty hard. Not alot of the air inside the barrel gets pulled into the rings. I found that as the smoke left the barrel most of it goes through the middle of the vortex or trails behind, only a ver small portion gets caught in the ring. If you could find the place in the barrel where the smoke from the ring originates you could try to concentrate the plasma there (via some process I can't imagine at the moment). Next clear evening I get I will try to find where the smoke in the smoke rings comes from and I will relay the info here.

Tesladownunder

Sun Jul 16 2006, 08:02AM

Registered Member #10 Joined: Thu Feb 02 2006, 09:45AM
Location: Bunbury, Australia
Posts: 1424

I don't need the plasma in the vortex, it disappears in milliseconds. I do need something luminous, long lived, and light enough to "fly" with the vortex without being ejected by centripetal force.
Some thing that oxidises slowly but is very light. Carbon and silicon have both been mentioned by others.
Things I have thought about are
1 tiny Al foils +/- and inert gas to limit the reaction initially.
2 Graphite powder - easy to try.
3 Volatile slow burning fluids such as kerosene, oil or alcohol also +/- inert gas.

When I tried the talcum powder the last time, I put it all on the rim of the outlet hoping it would get caught up in the vortex. Hard to tell if it did or not. but the flash of the ignition was much greater possibly as it acted as a white screen for the initial flash.
I agree that not much gets into the vortex. It is almost like it is separate from the blast and passes right through although it does slow down after. I would expect that it is only air at the rim that gets included. I had wondered about increasing efficiency of the vortex by having a central plug and tail off of some description. Should be easy to add as my system is modular.

Peter

Reaching

Sun Jul 16 2006, 10:21AM

Registered Member #76 Joined: Thu Feb 09 2006, 10:04AM
Location: Hemer, Germany
Posts: 458

mhh, i dont see any "ball lightning" effect on your video, its just a simple discharge with some particles for me, a big flyback arc can do more spectacular ball lightning effects when its high current. the plasma can exist a second or more in the air.

Tesladownunder

Sun Jul 16 2006, 11:43AM

Registered Member #10 Joined: Thu Feb 02 2006, 09:45AM
Location: Bunbury, Australia
Posts: 1424

Reaching wrote ...

mhh, i dont see any "ball lightning" effect on your video, its just a simple discharge with some particles for me, a big flyback arc can do more spectacular ball lightning effects when its high current. the plasma can exist a second or more in the air.

True. But I have generated a vortex structure with an electrical discharge that is stable and moves through the air at least through the 10 foot field of view. Filling it is another matter and no-one has succeeded at that yet.
Are you seeing the vortex on the video? The hazy grey area shown on the still photo wit the arrow is in rapid transit. out of the picture. Perhaps I recognise it better because I have seen it in slo-mo and frame by frame. Ignore the flash that drives it and just look at the grey smoke that leads upward and a little to the left.

In regards to the flyback, I challenge you to prove your statement of the plasma existing for more than a second. None of my observations of arcs up to 100kV suggest anything like that persistence of the tail of an arc separating from the main channel. Even the Eldorado switch station hot disconnect of one phase with the 100ft "Jacob's ladder" seems to be at most 5 frames ie 0.2 second assuming 25fps.

Peter

ragnar

Sun Jul 16 2006, 12:45PM

Registered Member #63 Joined: Thu Feb 09 2006, 06:18AM
Location:
Posts: 1425

I had a fiddle (at the expense of a free flyback) with quenching (or lack thereof) here -- see the bottom post.

Not stable for long enough to be much fun though. I've always dreamed of magnetically propelling it, never got round to that of course

1 2 next

Moderator(s): Chris Russell, Noelle, Alex, Tesladownunder, Dave Marshall, Dave Billington, Bjørn, Steve Conner, Wolfram, Kizmo, Mads Barnkob