Questions I would like to ask Mr. Tesla

[barbosi]

Please feel free to ask here you own questions and hope for a good inspiration coming from an answer. I know there might be many questions anyone may ask, especially "can I have the blue prints?".

I am only eagerly curious about one thing (as for a start):
- How did you know what frequencies you were dealing with when you were using the disruptive discharge through the spark gap? Or better yet, if you controlled also the pulse  duration within a cycle, how did you know the pulse width? Kind of two questions here... but I forgive myself for abusing the genius...

[alan]

I think he knew it by the rotational speed of his alternators.

[barbosi]

Alternators and not only were used to charge the capacitor.
My question was related to the discharge. With this disruptive discharge in copper bus bars he generated high frequency currents. How did he know about "millions of cycles per second"? How he determined that? Using a Herz-meter? 

[gyulasun]

Alternators and not only were used to charge the capacitor.
My question was related to the discharge. With this disruptive discharge in copper bus bars he generated high frequency currents. How did he know about "millions of cycles per second"? How he determined that? Using a Herz-meter? 

Hi,

Tesla built every kind of measuring equipment he had needed...

U.S. Patent 1,209,359  - Speed-Indicator - 1916 December 19 - Improvement that uses the adhesion and viscosity of a gaseous medium [preferably air] to measure speed [or measure the torque-transmission] between indicator and driver; Durable; Simple; Inexpensive; Reliable.
U.S. Patent 1,274,816  - Speed Indicator - 1918 August 6 - Speedometer that possesses the feature of: Linearly proportional torque readings; Strong low speed torsional effects; not affected by atmospheric density, temperature, nor magnetic influences; Rugged; Simple; Economical.
U.S. Patent 1,314,718  - Ship's Log - 1919 September 2 - Novel and advantageous construction of a ship's log; Instantaneous reading of knots or miles-per-hour.
U.S. Patent 1,329,559  - Valvular Conduit - 1920 February 3 - Improvement by means of a conduit or channel characterized by valvular action; Conduit has baffles, recesses, projections, enlargements, or buckets that channels the flow's movement one way more efficiently; Mechanical diode; One-way valve with no moving parts.
U.S. Patent 1,365,547  - Flow-Meter - 1921 January 11 - Related to the meter of measurement for velocity and quantity of fluid flow.
U.S. Patent 1,402,025  - Frequency-Meter - 1922 January 3 - Ascertain the periodic electric frequency and electric oscillation by the rotation or reciprocation of an electromechanical device.

To see these, copy and paste the patent number into this link: http://www.pat2pdf.org/

rgds,  Gyula

[barbosi]

Thanks for the effort to put together the list. It was a prolific start of 20-th century but Tesla presented before the Institution of Electrical Engineers, London, February 1892 the "EXPERIMENTS WITH ALTERNATE CURRENTS OF HIGH POTENTIAL AND HIGH FREQUENCY" and stated:

In the experiments such as performed this evening, we operate the coil either from a specially constructed alternator capable of giving many thousands of reversals of current per second, or, by disruptively discharging a condenser through the primary, we set up a vibration in the secondary circuit of a frequency of many hundred thousand or millions per second, if we so desire; and in using either of these means we enter a field as yet unexplored.

So he must knew before 1892 about those vibration rates, how to create them and how many cycles per second were.

He may have reached that conclusion after calculations? How can we calculate nowadays a frequency resulted from a disruptive discharge from a capacitor into a copper bar?