Sciencemadness Discussion Board - tesla electric car

tesla electric car

xxxxx - 12-9-2007 at 11:04

supposedly nikoli tesla constructed and drove an electric car which derived energy from unknown sources. wikipedia suggests the story is a fabrication, however there are patents regarding such devices and hitachi says the technology could work. i was wondering if anyone might have further comment on this subject.

Sauron - 12-9-2007 at 12:26

The man's name was Nikola Tesla not Nikoli.

Whose name is on these patents?

Tesla was a great genius, but died in poverty and relative obscurity. He was cheated by Edison and went into business with George Westinghouse after that. Together they built a little thing we know as Niagra Falls.

Edison's corporations after his death, have done a lot to try to rewrite history to marginalize Tesla, through their stooges in academia at Case Western Reserve and in the IEEE and even at the Smithsonian. I once saw an exhibit at the Natl Museum of American History that credited Edison with the technology that Tesla patented. There was a huge bust of Edison, but if you carefully scrutinized the patent certificate framed on the wall, Tesla was named as inventor not Edison.

I never heard anything about an electric car of his, though.

solo - 12-9-2007 at 12:58

Please read the material on this link and at the end you will know more about this human that once walked this earth..............solo

http://www.reformation.org/nikola-tesla.html

[Edited on 12-9-2007 by solo]

woelen - 12-9-2007 at 13:30

Is this site supposed to be humor, or should I take it seriously????

solo - 12-9-2007 at 13:44

Quote:

Originally posted by woelen
Is this site supposed to be humor, or should I take it seriously????

Which part is funny?....and what is not to be taken serious?.............. what are the reasons for your negative comment?...........solo

skiplex - 12-9-2007 at 14:11

That bit about Catholic immigrants being interested only in American wealth to return the Papal States to "their Master in Rome" while Tesla, being Greek Orthodox, was so pure of heart, seems more than a little paranoid toward Catholics.

And Tesla got his ideas through Divine Inspiration? I'll bet even Tesla himself would have chuckled at that one.

Overall, the whole thing comes across as far too worshipful of Tesla and too determined to demonize Edison. The truth probably lies somewhere in between.

[Edited on 9-12-2007 by skiplex]

bereal511 - 12-9-2007 at 15:35

"This necessitated the invention of Albert Einstein and his BIZARRE theories of the universe without an ether. Einstein invented absolutely NOTHING that was of any benefit to the human race."

???

Sauron - 12-9-2007 at 15:49

Let's keep the ridiculous religious bigotry out of this thread. It has no place on this forum.

Tesla was disadvantaged during and after WWI because he was a Serb. As a Serb he was likely to be Russian Orthodox not Greek Orthodox, for the record, not the same at all, not that I care.

not_important - 12-9-2007 at 16:13

Quote:

Originally posted by skiplex...
Overall, the whole thing comes across as far too worshipful of Tesla and too determined to demonize Edison. The truth probably lies somewhere in between.

What!? You've never read The Five Fists of Science?! The TRUTH about Tesla and Edison!

;-)

woelen - 12-9-2007 at 22:37

Quote:

Originally posted by solo

Quote:

Originally posted by woelen
Is this site supposed to be humor, or should I take it seriously????

Which part is funny?....and what is not to be taken serious?.............. what are the reasons for your negative comment?...........solo

I surfed around a little bit through other pages of the same site and at best it can only be considered as non-science (the non-rotating earth stuff, the geocentric view of the universe, the peculiar ideas about Einstein and his theories). This stuff makes me very doubtful on the page about Tesla as well.

indigofuzzy - 12-9-2007 at 23:17

Actually, IIRC, and if the biography I read was right, Telsa was an Atheist.

Sauron - 12-9-2007 at 23:40

It is a pity that so many nutters of the generic flat-Earther and flying suacer variety have latched onto Tesla as a cult figure. There are some very good and straight scientific sites about Tesla but some of the others are like this one cited above, and some are betwixt and between.

He worked for Edison first in France and then in USA. Edison was a plodder, cut and try sort of inventor not much given to thought or calculation. Tesla did not think much of that approach. The split came after Edison offered a $25,000 prize to anyone on his staff who could improve the efficiency of the AC induction motor (Tesla's invention) by a given percentage. Tesla wanted that prize, a lot of $$ in the 1890s, and sat down and invented the three phase AC motor, which met the requirement of improvement handily. But Edison welched on the prize, telling Tesla it had been a joke and that foreigners like him didn't understand American humor. (!) So off went Tesla to George Westinghouse and they became Edison's arch rivals, promoting AC power districution while Edison was determined to sell DC. Edison invented the electric chair to frighten the public about AC. In fact DC would be a lot more dangerous.

It is Tesla's fundamental and seminal work on power generation and transmission over distances that are his most lasting contribution along with AC motors. Too bad the Edison Institute lavishes money on academics and others engaged in the writing of the history of technology, to play up Edison's role while marginalizing Tesla's. Edison's real invention was the modern industrial research laboratory.

Moderator warning:

I am a fish - 13-9-2007 at 04:41

This is an interesting thread which runs the risk of degenerating into yet another religious/political quarrel. Please keep all religious references to a minimum. (If you wish to discuss Tesla's religious beliefs, that is fine. If you wish to debate religion in general, please do so elsewhere).

The_Davster - 13-9-2007 at 05:51

I have read a couple books on tesla, ones which completly avoided the religion/political situation of the time. Very fascinating devices he built, too bad he had the habit of not writing much down, so many of his ideas were lost upon his death.

Quote:

Edison's real invention was the modern industrial research laboratory.

How true, I read a book on his menlow park lab, it being the first commercial research lab, prior to which most research was done in university labs or at home. ( I think Edison started the beginning of the end of Home chemistry

)

Sauron - 13-9-2007 at 09:20

Edison was a technocrat rather than a scientist. Tesla was a scientist. Edison is celebrated by those, like the History of Technology crown at Case Western, who believe in the primacy and ascendancy of Technology over Science. Tesla is a hero to the scientists, professional and amateur alike, who know that one man's vision can make a difference.

I had a close friend with a PhD in Histyory of Technology from Case Western, Dr Edward C.Ezell. Ed was NASA's historian and then curator of the miliutary history division of Smithsonian, Natl Museum of American History which includes the National Firearms Collection. Many of you will know him as the editor who succeeded Joseph Smith and WHB Smith as editor of "Small Arms of the Worls". Unfortunately Ed passed away about a dozen years ago so I can't get his opinion on the Edison/Tesla thing but I am sure that as a Smithsonian insider he would have had some juicy gossip.

franklyn - 13-9-2007 at 17:52

This story of a car modified by Tesla is certainly apocryphal. I can say this
confidently because Tesla's exploits are well documented in newspapers
of the time and accounted for in many biographies by different authors.
This is not to say that this idea has no merit , far from that. Tela did
manage wireless transmition of electric power late in the 19th century when
at Colorado. This system could be engineered to power whatever you please.
This has never been properly investigated and assessed. The story relating
to a car is disingenuous in saying it obtains power from the " ether ", sure
the coupled power is wireless , but someone has to output power and make
it available to tap.

Vanity and politics often play larger roles in the acclaim of discovery than
the discoverer.
But this was better said by James Burke whom I quote here _
September 29, 1979 - TV Guide article introducing his essay " Connections "
" The first electric light was produced by an Englishman , Francis Hauksbee,
in 1706. 174 years before Edison patented his incandescent lamp. ( Hauksbee's
light was a dim, impractical glow , but it was an electric light inside a
vaccuumized glass globe ). Nor did Edison demonstrate the phenomenon of
electrical incandescence: Sir Humphry Davy had done that in 1802. Then
perhaps Edison obtained the first patent for an incandescent lamp? No :
Frederick de Moleyns did that in 1841. The first carbon-filament incandescent
lamp ? Sir Joseph Wilson Swan, 1850. Then what did Edison do ? After some
1200 experiments , he found a longer-lasting filament; and , with the crucially
important help of an improved vacuum pump devised by Hermann Sprengel,
he produced a lamp with a better vacuum; and he obtained a patent , in 1880.
In short , he put the practical finishing touches on a device others had begun
to develop long before he was born. "

A parallel to the Tesla - Edison conflict is the one of Armstrong - Deforest
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edwin_Howard_Armstrong
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lee_De_Forest
There are similarly issues which question the contributions and claims of
those credited with the determination of the structure of DNA.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosalind_Franklin
The discovery of fission similarly often omits mention of Lisa Meitner.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lisa_Meitner
There is even doubt as to the actual authorship of the Shakespeare plays
for which he is credited. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oxfordian_theory

Question : if America was discovered by Columbus ( forgeting for the moment
the 30 million or so indigenous inhabitants at that time ) why is it named for
Amerigo Vespucci ? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amerigo_Vespucci
North European descendants of Norsemen and founders of Vinland in modern
Newfoundland might similarly take issue with this.

.

Sauron - 13-9-2007 at 18:25

There was also a Tesla-Marconi patent dispute which was resolved in Tesla's favor (for wireless telegraphy) but the public still thinks of Marconi as the daddy of radio.

The Shakespeare controversy has been raging forever. It's make-work for literary academics.

I recommend a TV movie called LONGITUDE done by A&E, which chronicles the work of John Harrison, who built the first really accurate sea-clocks for navigation, seeking to win a 25000 pound sterling prize offered by Parliament. But the Board of Longitude set up to oversee this award was dominated by atronomers (starting with Sir E.Haley) and the atronomers obstructed Harrison all his life despite technical success. Eventually He received the prize but only by special act of Parliament when he was 80 years old! His sea clocks (originally made of wood) are still extant, at Greenwich, and still working. His eventual model was metal and resembles a large pocket watch. An utterly brilliant designer, innovator and craftsman, Harrison was no ass-kisser andclashed with the Board of Longitude for four decades.

Anyone involved in research of any sort who has ever had to deal with the bureaucracy, will find the story of Harrison to be highly resonant and satisfying.

Twospoons - 13-9-2007 at 18:57

I'd like to add http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Pearse to franklyn's list. While I know of no conflict between Pearse and the Wright Bros., this just illustrates once again that the "official" history is often incomplete, and sometimes downright wrong.

franklyn - 13-9-2007 at 20:42

@ Sauron
Richard Feynman
" I don't like honors. I'm appreciated for the work that I did, and for people who
appreciate it, and I notice that other physicists use my work. I don't need anything
else. I don't think there's any sense to anything else. I don't see that it makes any
point that someone in the Swedish Academy decides that this work is noble enough
to receive a prize. I've already got the prize. The prize is the pleasure of finding the
thing out, the kick in the discovery, the observation that other people use it. Those
are the real things. The honors are unreal to me. I don't believe in honors. It bothers
me, honors. Honors is epaulets, honors is uniforms. My poppa brought me up this way.
I can't stand it, it hurts me. When I was in High School, one of the first honors I got
was to be a member of the Arista, which is a group of kids who got good grades.
Everybody wanted to be a member of the Arista. I discovered that what they did in
their meetings was to sit around to discuss who else was worthy to join this
wonderful group that we are. OK So we sat around trying to decide who would get
to be allowed into this Arista. This kind of thing bothers me psychologically for one or
another reason. I don't understand myself. Honors, and from that day to this, always
bothered me. I had trouble when I became a member of the National Academy of
Science, and I had ultimately to resign. Because there was another organization,
most of whose time was spent in choosing who was illustrious enough to be allowed
to join us in our organization. Including such questions as: 'we physicists have to
stick together because there's a very good chemist that they're trying to get in and
we haven't got enough room...'. What's the matter with chemists? The whole thing
was rotten . Because the purpose was mostly to decide who could have this honor.
OK? I don't like honors."

@twospoons
Oh that's a big can of snakes that is _
http://www.aerospaceweb.org/question/history/q0159.shtml
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_flying_machine
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Early_flight
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_early_flying_machines
Actually the Wright's aircraft was so far beyond in capability
of anything else at that time it certainly was the first airplane
worthy of the name.

.

nitroglycol - 26-9-2007 at 04:06

There's a brief discussion here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tesla_electric_car

On the other hand, maybe you were thinking of this (which is real, and potentially very cool indeed):

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tesla_Roadster

Sauron - 26-9-2007 at 04:20

As someone pointed out already, Tesla's doings were followed closely by the news media and no record of these supposed vehicles is to be found. Tesla driving around in his electric car(s) with JP Morgan etc would have been big news. Instead, there is no record in the newspaper morgues.

So all that wiki stuff is likely to be hooey.

No one was talking about a contemporary development by a company that has purloined Tesla's name to promote themselves. With marketing tactics like that, I don't expect much but hot air from Tesla Motors. Maybe they should go into the ballon business.

[Edited on 26-9-2007 by Sauron]

Antwain - 26-9-2007 at 10:03

As for Lisa Meitner, I just finished reading a VERY good book 'Before the fallout: (from Marie Curie to Hiroshima)' and Part of the reason why there is so little acknowledgment of her work is plain and simply because she was a woman. I have no idea how Curie got to become a household name, but Meitler got screwed continuously, never got her name put to her work. She even had to go down the street to use the toilet because there wasn't a womens toilet in the building. But she has an element named after her now

, so I guess some people have acknowledged her.

Sauron - 26-9-2007 at 18:01

M.Curie got there along with P.Curie because she was, as Stonewall Jackson puts it, "the firstest with the mostest."

However I thought this thread was about an alledged Tesla car?

nitroglycol - 26-10-2007 at 17:58

Quote:

Originally posted by Sauron
As someone pointed out already, Tesla's doings were followed closely by the news media and no record of these supposed vehicles is to be found. Tesla driving around in his electric car(s) with JP Morgan etc would have been big news. Instead, there is no record in the newspaper morgues.

So all that wiki stuff is likely to be hooey.

Actually, the Wikipedia page implies that it is hooey:

Quote:

No physical evidence has been produced confirming that the car ever existed.

In light of the fact that Tesla did not have a nephew by the name of Peter Savo, the Tesla electric car story is considered to be a fabrication. A number of web pages exist that serve to perpetuate the tale. [1] Every account of this purported demonstration auto is based upon the 1967 story plus literary embellishment.

Now if you look at the second Wikipedia link I posted, you'll find a story about a car called the Tesla, and which is much more worthy of discussion- especially since we have a ready-made thread title.

[Edited on 26/10/2007 by nitroglycol]

chemrox - 26-10-2007 at 21:47

Quote:

Originally posted by Sauron
Together they built a little thing we know as Niagra Falls.
I never heard anything about an electric car of his, though.

I rather think that Niagra Falls is geologic phenomenon. Now if there is a hydroelectric plant there I could accept that Westinghouse and Tesla deserve the blame.

[Edited on 26-10-2007 by chemrox]

chemrox - 26-10-2007 at 22:13

Quote:

Originally posted by Sauron
As a Serb he was likely to be Russian Orthodox not Greek Orthodox, for the record, not the same at all, not that I care.

As a Greek Orthodox I can say with certainty that the Serbian Orthodox Church is closer to Greek Orthodoxy than Russian Orthodoxy. I'm pretty much a Buddhist now but I was baptized in the Greek Church and practiced in it for some time. We had some joint services with the Serbians but never with the Russians.

This is way off topic. The article does take a few cheap shots and shows a certain bias on the part of the author but Tesla does have 700+ patents and did invent wireless power transmission. Today we'd think of the EM polution involved and probably reject it on that basis. While keeping cell phones and community-wide wireless computer networks ...

Tesla was supposedly involved in a US Navy effort to nullify radar by putting so much charge on the ships that the signals were completely absorbed. This is aprt of the so-called Phildelphia Story legend in which it is claimed he made a ship dissapear and did some Star-Trek stuff to the crew as well. A friend and I built a Tesla Coil that we kicked off with a Ford coil. That fucker put out 12 foot sparks.

chemrox - 26-10-2007 at 22:20

@franklin
Now Feynman was a great man! One of the greatest because he was such an outstanding teacher making science palpable and exciting to so many.

Xenoid - 26-10-2007 at 22:44

Quote:

Originally posted by chemrox
...... A friend and I built a Tesla Coil that we kicked off with a Ford coil. That fucker put out 12 foot sparks.

Now that, I find very hard to believe....!

I've seen plenty of Tesla coil designs, powered by automotive ignition coils, and I can assure you they don't produce 12 foot sparks...... 12cm perhaps!

Regards, Xenoid

gsd - 14-12-2007 at 08:08

Dr. Nikola Tesla: Complete Patents (Fully Illustrated)

By John T. Ratzlaff / Dr. Nikola Tesla

http://rapidshare.com/files/49345358/_0913022446.part1.rar

http://rapidshare.com/files/49344680/_0913022446.part2.rar

One pdf document in 2 parts rar files. It gives error message during unpacking but the final 499 page pdf appears OK.

Not browsed thru the complete document but looks like a very interesting collection

gsd

MagicJigPipe - 14-12-2007 at 20:28

I'm sure one could be designed to make 12 foot sparks... WAY more than 12cm can be produced easily.

franklyn - 10-10-2011 at 19:01

This deserves special mention , it preceded Henry Ford's contribution by 20 years and was twice as fast.
http://money.cnn.com/2011/10/10/autos/worlds_oldest_car/inde...

.

Rosco Bodine - 10-10-2011 at 19:38

Stanley Steamers are the most famous steam cars, and they were fast too

http://www.stanleymotorcarriage.com/

http://www.stanleymotorcarriage.com/GeneralTechnical/General...

Seems like I recall somebody made a conversion burner that used a water suspension of powdered coal as a substitute for fuel oil, and the burner
would bring up a full head of steam in under one minute from a cold start.

franklyn - 11-10-2011 at 06:06

Quote: Originally posted by Rosco Bodine

Seems like I recall somebody made a conversion burner that used a water suspension of powdered coal as a
substitute for fuel oil, and the burner would bring up a full head of steam in under one minute from a cold start.

Don't know about the coal slurry , but the one minute flash boiler was
a feature of the steam car built by Bill Lear of Learjet plane fame and
also originator of the 8 track tape player for cars.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Lear
http://books.google.com/books?id=KtgDAAAAMBAJ&lpg=PA128&...
http://books.google.com/books?id=1ykDAAAAMBAJ&lpg=PA45&a...

DeathAdder - 19-10-2011 at 18:08

I really think he meant to say TESLA RODESTER (did i spell that right) which is an electric car that uses Tesla's AC current,Edison also executed an elephant and prisioners and called it morbidly i assume "Westinghousing" tesla's prize from Edison was supposed to be 50k not 25k that is always what i've heard. Tesla would have won the prize for re-designing his generators and he did build the first (that i know of) hydroelectric plant which is now in disrepair.

franklyn - 28-1-2014 at 17:48

http://www.theverge.com/2014/1/28/5354112/porsche-first-vehi...

http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/cars/2014/01/27/first-po...

http://www.roadandtrack.com/go/news/the-first-porsche

Specifications
http://www.porschecentreoakville.com/press/The-first-Porsche...

.

Fenir - 28-1-2014 at 19:19

I have heard that Tesla Roadsters is currently trying to build a car powered by supercapacitors. Such a vehicle would charge quickly. The graphene production for such an enterprise could pose interesting chemical conundrums.