Science and Invention - Tesla's Oscillator

It Proves the Ether Theory in a Commercially-Practical Manner.

An electrician was asked the other day by a Chicago Record reporter if he knew what electricity was. He replied:

"Had this question been put to me a few years ago I would have said that no man knew. But now we know that electricity is a form of etheric vibration, and that a current of electricity is a series of ether waves. These electric vibrations, as I should call them, flash along a wire in 'whorls,' or rings, sliding along on the outside of the wire or other conductor much as a rubber band would slide along a lead pencil. These vibrations communicate similar vibrations to the surrounding and ever-present ether, just as the vibrations of the human vocal chords or the wires of a piano set the air in sympathetic vibration and produce sound. This view was held by several scientist’s years ago, but the last few years have proved to the satisfaction of progressive electricians that the vibratory theory is correct. Probably no one man has done more to show this than young Nikola Tesla, the brilliant electrician, who has shown successfully and practically, by means of his 'oscillator,' that etheric vibrations will light up wireless electric lamps and transform dark, cold masses into luminous bodies.

"This oscillator, which was hailed by the electric world as one of the most important inventions of the century, is a dynamo — a generator of electricity — but, unlike the standard dynamo, it is an engine and generator in one. It is marvelously simple and wonderfully efficient, and has permitted Tesla to obtain results that cannot be secured with the ordinary conventional type of an electrical machine.

"The ordinary dynamo is a familiar object. It consists of two principal pants, the armature and field magnets. The electric current is generated by passing a loop of wire through the magnetic field, or lines of force, of powerful magnets. If a small piece of wire is passed close to and in front of the poles of an ordinary horseshoe magnet electricity is generated in the wire. The current is feeble, perhaps, but it is there. If the power of the magnet and the number of wires are increased, the intensity of the electric current is increased in proportion. If the wire is held still, and the magnet is moved, electricity is the result. If a bar magnet is plunged into a coil of wire, an electric current is produced, and if this magnet is moved in and out of the coil the current alternates.

"Tesla's oscillator consists of a steam-chest, in which are two pistons so arranged that the steam moves them back and forth at a high rate of speed. The piston rod passes clear through both ends of the steam chest, and carries on each end a coil of wire which is an armature. These armatures move back and forth between the field magnets, thus generating current by their actions. An immense number of oscillations a minute are secured, and consequently currents of high potential, high frequency and high regularity are generated, having an infinite number of alternations or vibrations a second. As electricity travels 186,000 miles a second, the imagination only dares to picture the molecular and atomic agitation and excitement caused by the inconceivable number of vibrations or waves which are set in motion by the electric shuttle flashing back and forth over the wire.

"The molecular energy in the sun sends hundreds of trillions of ether waves or vibrations every second to the earth. If these waves have a lower frequency than 500,000,000,000,000 a second, heat chiefly is engendered. To produce the sensation of light the vibrations must equal or exceed that number a second. Every self-luminous body, such as a gaslight, burning coal, the incandescent filament in an electric light, a lighted match, sends out this 'radiant energy,' which is transmitted by the ether medium. The ether theory is not new, but Nikola Tesla has proved, in a commercially practical manner, that this ether is a medium which transmits energy.

"Around a room he runs an electric cable connected with his oscillator. In the center of the cleared space he places a large coil of wire, wound drum fashion, about four feet high. This coil is not connected in any way — that is, with wires, rods or conductors of any sort — with the cable. On top of the coil are two condenser plates, thin metallic disks, standing upright and facing each other. The plates are as resonant as cymbals, and are provided with set-screws, so that their rate of vibration can be changed. So long as the plates are not vibrating in unison with the vibrations induced by the electric cable, no particular effect is seen, but when they are 'tuned' so that the rate of vibrations of the induced currents is the same as those of the cable current, powerful sparks pour from one plate to the other. In this manner tensions as high as 200,000 to 300,000 volts are easily reached.

"When the coil of wire is adjusted to the vibrations of the current running around the cable an incandescent lamp is lighted up. A lamp attached to a circle of wire, held freely in the hands over the resonant coil, is immediately lighted up, although the wire is held some distance from the coil. Empty bulbs are lighted in free space 20 feet from the coil, and photographs have been taken by the light, and motors are driven by connecting them with the resonant coil. All of these results demonstrate the actuality, the real tangibleness of ether, and the vibratory theory, according to those who have witnessed Mr. Tesla's work, is proved beyond a doubt."