Product Description

In this recently discovered transcript of a three day interview conducted in 1916, Nikola Tesla, using words and graphic illustrations, provides a step by step description of his remarkable accomplishments in the area of radio frequency engineering. In a style uniquely his own, Tesla carefully traces his work - from the first high frequency alternators constructed at his New York City Grand Street laboratory and their associated tuned circuits through the establishment of his huge broadcasting facility, the Wardenclyffe Plant, at Shoreham, Long Island. Among the variety of topics discussed are: high frequency alternators, experiments with wireless telegraphy and telephony, mechanical and electrical oscillators, the Colorado experiments, theory and technique of energy transmission, the Long Island plant, and arrangements for receiving. Seldom, in technical research, has such a treasure of descriptive commentary and historical documentation been discovered. The previously untold story found within the pages of this remarkable book has been described by the prominent Tesla researcher James Corum as a "veritable Rosetta stone" for tracing the technical thoughts of one of our most distinguished engineering scientists. Includes 61 photos and 42 line-art illustrations, many never before published.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #3423354 in Books
• Published on: 1992-05
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 237 pages

Review
"The fledgling broadcast industry of the early 1900s was blighted by fierce patent litigations. Patents in this highly innovative field were often loosely formulated and most wireless systems contained devices whose patents were held by several inventors or Entrepreneurs. One of the most charismatic of these people was Nikola Tesla... This document, never intended for publication, is a transcript of a pre-hearing interview with Tesla by his legal counsel in 1916... Tesla gives a fascinating account of the stages that led him in the 1890s to attempt to transmit electrical power through the earth without the use of wires. -- Nature, June 17, 1993, Vol. 363, page 592.

"The subject of this book is a collection of Interviews conducted with Tesla by his legal counsel in 1916. The Marconi Wireless Telegraph Co. sought to trample all competition by patenting every device used in radio communication. Tesla was interviewed to document his prior work and accomplishments, and thus protect them from rapacious Marconi Co. Although the interview took place over seven days, the editor has assembled the transcript into a contiguous document... And what a document! Tersla well knew what fascinating work he was doing, and you can sense his enthusiasm as he describes apparatus capable of generating tens of thousands of volts and drawing sparks 135 feet long. Indeed, one of his goals was to broadcast energy through the air, rather than via wires... reduce the power and modulate the wave and you have radio... -- QST, March 1995, page 116

"This material provides both technical and anecdotal evidence on Tesla's experiments with and applications of wireless telegraphy and telephony. In addition to their new data, these transcripts also provide readers with a different sense of Tesla's personality. -- Society for the History of Technology, Antenna Newsletter, December 1992, page 3

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
...This [photograph] shows the first single step I made toward the evolution of an apparatus which, given primary oscillations, will transform them into oscillations capable of penetrating the medium. That experiment, which was marvelous at the time it was performed, was shown for the first time in 1894. I remember the incident perfectly. I called Mr. Edward Adams, the banker, to come and see it, and he was the first man to observe it and to hear my explanation of what it meant.

This coil, which I have subsequently shown in my patents Nos. 645,576 and 649,621, in the form of a spiral, was, as you see in the form of a cone. The idea was to put the coil, with reference to the primary, in an inductive connection which was not close --we call it now loose coupling -- but free to permit great resonant rise. That was the first single step, as I say, toward the evolution of an invention which I have called my "magnifying transmitter." That means, a circuit connected to ground and to an antenna, of a tremendous electromagnetic momentum and small damping factor, with all the conditions so determined that an immense accumulation of electrical energy can take place.