Thunderstorms

[AKRYPTO]

Hmmm , As another cell rolls on through, it brings my thoughts to floating a Wire on a kite with a key attached to it. Would love to harness the energy in mother natures Amp.

[gordon_s1942]

Sounds perfect to really light up your Eyes with this one.

When you consider that a strike under 500 meters away emits enough EMF to usually kill cordless phones, TV's and pop circuit breakers along with a deafening clap of thunder would be somewhat lethal to anyone holding a conductor irrespective of the insulation between the 'Key and Thee'
If I have read and understood the reports correctly, lightning discharges FROM the Ground UP, not the other way.

I would say this experiment has been conducted numerous times but the only ones we hear about are those who only got a partial discharge enough to magnetize the key, those who actually did get the full hit most likely disappeared in the ensuring smoke.

I would suggest you arrange for an observer to assist you and take notes and if your successful, post those results on your behalf.

[mtv]

Why a key?

I don't see how your post is relevant to 'communication devices' so moved to 'General Science' which seems more appropriate.

[gordon_s1942]

A Morse code key maybe trying to emulate the original spark gap transmitters used by Tesla and Marconi.

[AKRYPTO]

Trust me I fully understand the "death option" and having had had a fan dipole burnt last storm season, I was only speaking in gest and have no intentions on messing with the force from the sky.

[gordon_s1942]

So I can withdraw your nomination for an entry on the Darwin Awards then???

Your no fun at all, dratttt it................

But its been grumbling here the last few days and while most has been at a distance, its this time last year I did the TV and the cordless phone base which a friend said his cordless base was zapped and it flipped one of his house's 2 Mains Circuit breakers 2 nights ago.
In both instances these items were connected to surge protectors that wernt affected.

[AKRYPTO]

So I can withdraw your nomination for an entry on the Darwin Awards then???

Your no fun at all, dratttt it................

But its been grumbling here the last few days and while most has been at a distance, its this time last year I did the TV and the cordless phone base which a friend said his cordless base was zapped and it flipped one of his house's 2 Mains Circuit breakers 2 nights ago.
In both instances these items were connected to surge protectors that wernt affected.

Yep every time I leave the radio shack I unplug and disconnect all that I can. Its almost OCD like behavior but I don't have endless bank accounts to replace fried equipment. And In my younger formative years I had many applications in for a Darwin award and survived them all !! Lord only knows how !! Cheers.

[trash]

You do realise there is a "better" way to achieve this mischief ???
I keep telling you that you have to come to a local club meeting, this is the kind of shit we do.

Get yourself a roll of fine copper wire and a tent peg and a helium balloon from spotlight.
Also a short look of wire and a roll of fishing line.

Tie the end of the fine copper wire to the balloon and attach the loop of wire to it and hook it over the tent peg in the ground.
Roll out the fishing line for a few hundred feet and then attach it too the wire loop.

Now as the storm approaches you're ready to go. Standing at the other end of the fishing line you pull the loop off the peg and away the balloon goes towing the copper wire as it unwinds.
It floats up into the storm and the first stroke of lightning near the wire is drawn to it and takes advantage of the short cut to Earth.

The effect of the lightning vaporising the copper wire is most pleasing !

[Onefella]

I always thought the answer to harnessing the very high and quick charge of lighting, lies with storing the charge in massive capacitors.

I mean HUGE capacitors. Like a network of underground caverns with capacitor 'tanks' made of very simple aluminium plates suspended in air as the dielectric.

The capacitor banks may be able to sink the very high voltage of a strike and hold the charge long enough, to be able to step-down the very high e.m.f. to something a little more useable.

Another option might be to have a 'network' of Trash's electrically connected foil balloons, all floating up in the storm cloud and 'siphoning-off' the build-up charge before it becomes high-enough to trigger a strike.

[gordon_s1942]

Yeah but thats too practical, there's no Eye blinding Flash, or Eardrum bursting Crash and smell of burning Ozone in the air doing it that way.

With Trash's way, theres always the chance of setting a conductive path between yourself and where the copper wire is held and having your eyes light up when the strike hits as a fork of EMF backtracks to you.

Anybody participating in such experiments are requested to fill in a form with their name and DNA/fingerprints on it, have their body parts numbered for ease of identification,
have the area where their standing grid marked in one metre squares so measurements can be taken of what lands where, at least 2 video cameras set well away focusing on you, at least one observer, more preferred also equipped with both still and video cameras but standing well back and finally, any last requests if enough is found for a funeral and what you would like said during the eulogy.

[Uncle Fester]

You do realise there is a "better" way to achieve this mischief ???
I keep telling you that you have to come to a local club meeting, this is the kind of shit we do.

Get yourself a roll of fine copper wire and a tent peg and a helium balloon from spotlight.
Also a short look of wire and a roll of fishing line.

Tie the end of the fine copper wire to the balloon and attach the loop of wire to it and hook it over the tent peg in the ground.
Roll out the fishing line for a few hundred feet and then attach it too the wire loop.

Now as the storm approaches you're ready to go. Standing at the other end of the fishing line you pull the loop off the peg and away the balloon goes towing the copper wire as it unwinds.
It floats up into the storm and the first stroke of lightning near the wire is drawn to it and takes advantage of the short cut to Earth.

The effect of the lightning vaporising the copper wire is most pleasing !

Have you had actually success with this, any video available?


Could a lightning strike directed this way be able to start up a proper nuclear fusion generator?
Once triggered this way could it be able to create enough energy to sustain itself and deliver energy without fizzling away?

[trash]

I never considered videoing my experiments like that one because honestly, I never expected it to work.
However, I'm not a candidate for the Darwin awards. I may tease the monkeys at the zoo, but I know exactly how far they can reach out of their cage !

I actually only used a short length of copper wire, about 25 metres long. That's all that was on the reel. I wouldn't have used anything much longer anyway because it would have slowed the balloon lifting with the weight and I was much more worried about power lines than I ever was about a lightning strike. It was very unlikely that a strike was going to happen when launching the balloon because it was about 3km away.
The lightning struck the wire at altitude. The lightning had a strange short straight section in the stroke. What I'd love to do is have a much longer wire, but this increases the risk of a ground strike during launch. And a balloon being dragged by the wind at launch... think of a place without power lines like an open paddock and then, you realise that it's a place lightning likes to strike the ground.

Lightning isn't capable of any sort of nuclear reaction. Lightning does emit gamma rays, or more correctly; very high energy X-rays that look like gamma rays.
Gamma rays are sourced from the nucleus of an atom, X-rays come from the inner electron shells. They're not nuclear as such.

I'm guessing you're working the ball lightning gig here.
I'll go out on a limb here and say that most physicists probably don't think that ball lightning is any sort of real phenomena.
More likely that people are mistaken seeing something else which they don't understand and call it ball lightning for lack of a better description.

There was a video I saw on TV a couple of weeks ago. It was of a lightning strike on some power lines. It was an excellent example of some kind of ball lightning.
These days I tend to treat every video as a fake, but I asked myself. Assuming this is a real video; What am I seeing ?

The ball lightning moved along the power lines like a plasma ball or something more akin to cartoon physics than anything we're used to seeing from lightning.
However, once I stopped and thought about it for a few seconds I quickly found something that looked similar.
A jacobs ladder. The only problem is that jacobs ladders really only work vertically. The plasma heats up and rises and the arc follows the low resistance plasma.

A jacobs ladder doesn't work sideways ! Heat doesn't move sideways along the power lines. It rises up above the power lines and the arc stops.

A bit of Occam's theorem applied here. The simple answer is that lightning strikes the power line. The power lines arc over between the phases triggered by the original stroke.
The lightning bolt current stops but the arc between the cables is still hot enough to continue conducting. The hot plasma/gas now starts to rise, but the wind is also blowing the same
direction as the power lines at just the right speed to allow the arc to continue generating along the power lines. The effect looks like a big plasma ball moving along the power lines rather than just a single spark which is more familiar.

Not a win for the concept of ball lightning, but a bit of a win for science being able to explain the bizarre behaviour of electricity in that situation.

[freakee1]

f

[AKRYPTO]

Trash, Muwahahahahah! I may just have to make an appearance at a meeting. Cheers.

[weirdo]

Trash, Muwahahahahah! I may just have to make an appearance at a meeting. Cheers.

be careful what you get into mate
he'll make you hold the copper wire

[trash]

hehehe.... I fell off my chair laughing.

Thanks freakee, that's the video I was thinking of. If somebody hasn't seen it before it just looks baffling and a great candidate for ball lightning.
But close and careful inspection shows it's a jacobs ladder, and a very cool example of one driven by wind rather than heat of the arc.
I'm about to post it on the club facebook site.

Yes, you're welcome any time akrypto. There's a good smattering of trouble makers in the club. Club meetings are never formal and if they ever are they quick degenerate back to subjects
like those involving flammable substances, small fury animals exposed to large RF fields or crashing small objects into larger objects.

[AKRYPTO]

Trash, whens the next meeting? will see if I am not working

[trash]

It should be this friday night.
I'll be hauling arse back from Victoria but I should be there in time.
I'll check the club page to see what the agenda is for this month and who is attending.

[Godzilla]

I don't see how your post is relevant to 'communication devices' so moved to 'General Science' which seems more appropriate.

The OP has a wanting to communicate with God in person.

[best4less]

MMM Time to teach the wife to fly a Kite I guess