Donald Smith Devices too good to be true

[tswift]

OK, back to the actual research. Here is some of the experimenting I did yesterday. First, after tuning the L1 primary coil to resonance at roughly 500 KHz, I checked the capacitance of the C1 tuning capacitor to find the resonant value. Given the inductance of the coil I was expecting about 100 pF, and sure enough I measured 93 pF:
https://gateway.ipfs.io/ipfs/QmUu3QE...j/IMG_1533.JPG

Then I grabbed one of the many coils from my bin-o-previous-projects, an 80-turn coil on a 2: cardboard coil form. I can try using this as an L2 coil without having to wind a new one, at least for starters. It measures just under 80 uH:
https://gateway.ipfs.io/ipfs/QmUu3QE...j/IMG_1534.JPG

Now we will need a C2 tuning capacitor to bring the L2 coil into the same resonance as the L1 coil. Since the inductance of L2 is much less than L1, the capacitance has to be correspondingly more. The good news is that the voltage on the L2 side is much less, so we don't need a high-voltage tuning cap here with wide gaps between the plates. I had this one handy, it's one of the common "365 pF" radio tuning caps. It has two sections, and they can be paralleled for twice the capacitance, as seen in this picture. The maximum capacitance with the plates fully meshed is about 760 pF tested:
https://gateway.ipfs.io/ipfs/QmUu3QE...j/IMG_1536.JPG

And the minimum capacitance is about 40 pF. Note that this cheap L/C meter is probably not all that accurate, but it seems to do an adequate job for this purpose.
https://gateway.ipfs.io/ipfs/QmUu3QE...j/IMG_1537.JPG

Comparing the two variable capacitors, C1 and C2, you can see at a glance the difference in the spacing between the plates. The C1 cap looks somewhat odd because the one I bought off of ebay wasn't the model I was expecting and I had to rebuild it by doubling up the little spacers between the plates to get them wide enough. Hopefully the C1 cap should handle several kilovolts without arcing over between the plates now.
https://gateway.ipfs.io/ipfs/QmUu3QE...j/IMG_1539.JPG

Here's the arrangement for testing for resonance using a function generator. The L2 and C2 coils are in parallel, being driven by the function generator through a 10K ohm resistor. This produces a fairly sharp voltage peak right at resonance as you tune the function generator. This is because of the high impedance of the parallel LC tank circuit formed by L2 and C2. At exact resonance, the capacitive reactance and inductive reactance exactly cancel and it appears as a high resistance, proportional to the tuned circuit Q.
https://gateway.ipfs.io/ipfs/QmUu3QE...j/IMG_1540.JPG

Here is the scope and function generator being used to tune for resonance. With the C2 cap fully closed (maximum capacitance) the resonant frequency is right about 680 KHz. To tune down to 500 KHz to match the L1/C1 side, we will need to add a fixed capacitor in parallel with C2. I haven't yet calculated how much this needs to be, but probably around 500 pF as a first guess.
https://gateway.ipfs.io/ipfs/QmUu3QE...j/IMG_1541.JPG

Here is a short video of how to tune for resonance with a function generator. Watch as I change the cap holding the function generator frequency constant, and then change the frequency holding the capacitance constant. This is where a digital oscilloscope makes your life much easier because it will calculate and display the frequency in real time, fairly accurately. A separate frequency counter would also work for this. It would also be possible to connect the high voltage supply and spark gap to the L2/C2 combo like I did with the L1/C1 combo and read the ring frequency off of the scope, it should exactly match the results obtained this way with the function generator.
https://gateway.ipfs.io/ipfs/QmUu3QEhtVec3ADaXCvamrZEvijBLbwb9P34cYWKoWgacj/MVI_1544.MP4

Edit: I tried to include the pictures inline but they were too large to display correctly. I included them as links instead, you'll have to open each one to load and then you can see it either full size or scaled as you choose. Hopefully I got all these IPFS links correct, they just link directly to files on my computer. I apologize for the large file sizes, but I think about how much time I have spent studying pictures and videos by other researchers and I always wished the pictures were clearer so you could see every detail. I shoot them in full 10MP camera resolution for archival and now you can see them that way too. Using IPFS you can also download them to your computer easily, there are several different ways to do it. Learn more about IPFS.

[serendipitor]

I guess I might just join the party, as I have most of what is needed on hand from past experiments. I'm a long time radio enthusiast so I have wires and grounds already, and some high voltage broadcast transmitter parts to use. Some comments and questions about the circuit:

* I wonder about the antenna, which is approximately 1/4 wavelength at 500kHz, but will vary widely depending on height and soil conditions. An antenna modeling program shows the impedance of the antenna to be very low, just a few ohms. I don't know enough about the PPV, but I would hope that there is isolation from the very high impedance of L1 and C2 in resonance. Since this is apparently a spiky, nonlinear circuit, it is perhaps not relevant to match to the antenna in a conventional E/M sense. Also, my experience with RF transformers like this would say that C3 is probably extra. One side of the L1-L2 couple affects the other such that the whole is resonated with C2, and C3 would so strongly depend on C2 that it could be eliminated. The transformer ought to be ringing more or less continuously, so is operating in the conventional linear domain, as far as I can tell.

* A long wire as shown, low to the ground, with tens of kilovolts DC on it, is going to need an observer while in use. I would like to know more about the performance with height, as just a few meters higher, like the power lines, would be much safer. Anything that can come in contact with people or animals is not practical.

* Given this I wonder what the real requirement of the antenna portion is. If it is drawing ions towards it, then would not surface area be more to the point, as shown in Tesla's flat plate collectors? I guess only experiment will tell.

* Is there any data to indicate performance versus DC voltage on the antenna? I would guess it to be more or less linear, but maybe there is some sort of threshold. I have my doubts about putting very high voltage (>30kV) on something out in the weather (especially in rainy areas) as the need for extreme insulators becomes a limitation.

* What are possible alternatives to the PPV component that could give some sort of "foot in the door" testing? I would like to see something interesting before sending $100 off to Bruce. Is he actively making these valves now? One thing I would like to see is the waveform across D5. What are people using at this point? I am not familiar with fast recovery diodes at this voltage level, but would be able to try a string of lower voltage units which are on hand. Certainly the current demands are tiny, given the 10Meg resistor in series.

* I can't see that super caps are a real necessity. Either the circuit is making enough to send back to the HVM, or it is not. More capacity does not change things, unless there is a *highly* intermittent nature to the impulses. Conventional caps should do OK, if this is going to yield watts of power over time.

Best of luck in all your experiments. I have looked into Bruce's Yahoo group, but there does not seem to be much in the way of excitement there. As soon as I get any results one way or the other, I will post them here.

[tswift]

Serendipitor,

Welcome to the party. We're all on the same journey here, Bruce knows more than Paul, who knows more than me. I'm just following along based on Bruce's publication and a few private hints. If you contact Paul, he will tell you some more important details. With a ham radio background (me too) and some experience with Don Smith style building/experiments this should be relatively familiar territory.

Most of your antenna questions are the same ones I had. Think Beverage antenna. For sure we are not dealing with just conventional EM or this wouldn't necessarily make sense. I had the same idea about the flat plate collector or even larger diameter wire, but apparently that doesn't matter in this context.

About the PPV, I think it is essentially just a specialized modified spark gap. A conventional spark gap, perhaps with some modifications, should be enough to get started.

And the supercaps, if you have studied Don Smith he often talked about capacitors being the receivers of radiant energy (he used several different terms). There is a paper (the "Ambient Energy Generator") where he says outright that the energy collected is proportional to the size of the capacitors and mentions supercaps. I assume that for the best effects these are necessary.

It is at one and the same time an advantage and challenge to be familiar with conventional electrical engineering, circuits, and radio. We are dealing with the realm of the unconventional where some of the normal rules may not apply but it's not immediately clear which ones. I am just building according to instructions received so far and seeing where we go from here.

[med.3012]

I must say I'm surprised with everyone here. A long-time forum member comes on with claims that he knows more about this technology than we do and nobody is interested or considers it worth their time to check it out?

don't be surprised ! a lots of great inventors lived within us and they are dead now ( peace for them ) maybe they didn't had the time to give everything to us but do we listened carefully to what they said ?

believe me there's a lots of racism in the internet and of course a lots of stupidity ! Don Smith said it clearly ! Brain washed !

[soundiceuk]

I guess I might just join the party, as I have most of what is needed on hand from past experiments. I'm a long time radio enthusiast so I have wires and grounds already, and some high voltage broadcast transmitter parts to use. Some comments and questions about the circuit:

* I wonder about the antenna, which is approximately 1/4 wavelength at 500kHz, but will vary widely depending on height and soil conditions. An antenna modeling program shows the impedance of the antenna to be very low, just a few ohms. I don't know enough about the PPV, but I would hope that there is isolation from the very high impedance of L1 and C2 in resonance. Since this is apparently a spiky, nonlinear circuit, it is perhaps not relevant to match to the antenna in a conventional E/M sense. Also, my experience with RF transformers like this would say that C3 is probably extra. One side of the L1-L2 couple affects the other such that the whole is resonated with C2, and C3 would so strongly depend on C2 that it could be eliminated. The transformer ought to be ringing more or less continuously, so is operating in the conventional linear domain, as far as I can tell.

* A long wire as shown, low to the ground, with tens of kilovolts DC on it, is going to need an observer while in use. I would like to know more about the performance with height, as just a few meters higher, like the power lines, would be much safer. Anything that can come in contact with people or animals is not practical.

* Given this I wonder what the real requirement of the antenna portion is. If it is drawing ions towards it, then would not surface area be more to the point, as shown in Tesla's flat plate collectors? I guess only experiment will tell.

* Is there any data to indicate performance versus DC voltage on the antenna? I would guess it to be more or less linear, but maybe there is some sort of threshold. I have my doubts about putting very high voltage (>30kV) on something out in the weather (especially in rainy areas) as the need for extreme insulators becomes a limitation.

* What are possible alternatives to the PPV component that could give some sort of "foot in the door" testing? I would like to see something interesting before sending $100 off to Bruce. Is he actively making these valves now? One thing I would like to see is the waveform across D5. What are people using at this point? I am not familiar with fast recovery diodes at this voltage level, but would be able to try a string of lower voltage units which are on hand. Certainly the current demands are tiny, given the 10Meg resistor in series.

* I can't see that super caps are a real necessity. Either the circuit is making enough to send back to the HVM, or it is not. More capacity does not change things, unless there is a *highly* intermittent nature to the impulses. Conventional caps should do OK, if this is going to yield watts of power over time.

Best of luck in all your experiments. I have looked into Bruce's Yahoo group, but there does not seem to be much in the way of excitement there. As soon as I get any results one way or the other, I will post them here.

If you send me some build pictures I will help you build a PPV. It is quite simple but is only being told to builders in confidence.

tswift is going to show it but only builders are told how to build it.

Sorry for the secrecy folks but big business could use this against us!

[Mwtj]

I will join too. Got heaps of don smith stuff laying around so might as well use it en see if we get this stuff working.
Got the same questions about the ANT and PPV. Sizewize i do not have space for the 468 feet antenna wire so can it be shorter?

[soundiceuk]

Build a loop antenna of 468ft if you have no space.

Antenna must be bare copper wire.

0.25mm will do. Or whatever you have laying around.


Just use two steel bolts for now like tswift.

They must be shaped in the way his are.

You will see this very soon.


Tswift has a good elevation of 1000ft above sea level. If you are close to sea level your results will not be as good.

His results will be very interesting!

Surface area of the earth is huge especially if you are hitting water table!
That is why surface area of the antenna is not important.

A good ground connection is important.

[tswift]

Some practical build notes:

1. 30 AWG wire is about 0.25mm and is what I'm using. On order, not received or installed yet. It's not easy to find uncoated bare bright copper wire in larger quantities, smaller quantities are easy because it's used in jewelry and crafts. One US supplier is parawire.com, unfortunately they have a $25 minimum order and a 1 lb spool of 30 AWG is less than that, so you'll have to order two or get something else. A 1 lb spool is probably a lifetime supply, it's something like 3200 feet long.

2. My spark gap is two 2" standard US 1/4" steel carriage bolts (round head) in the plastic case of an old 80mm computer fan. Done this way it's easy to adjust the gap width fairly precisely since the bolts have 20 threads to the inch. Each full turn is 0.05 inches, so 1/4 turn is 0.0125 inches for instance. Just scavenge an old dead computer fan or even sacrifice a working one, they're cheap. This won't work for high-power projects like a larger Tesla coil or something where the gap will get quite hot because it will melt the plastic, but it works OK for small power levels up to maybe a few tens of watts. If you're brave you can even pinch the plastic sides of the fan case while your setup is running and flex it a bit to increase the gap and see what difference it makes, or pinch the sides with the bolts (holding near the corners, obviously) to decrease it. Sometimes with a wider gap setting the spark won't be self-striking and you have to pull it in momentarily to get an initial strike. The fan case setup makes this easy to do. As always, observe the "one-hand" rule for high voltage: don't be touching anything else with any other part of your body. If you do accidentally zap yourself it will just be on one hand and it will get your attention but shouldn't actually be dangerous. In this circuit we're discussing none of the caps store enough energy to be really dangerous anyway.

3. The long flat-handled screwdriver seen in some of my pictures is my "Spock stick". As in, by judicious use of it to short all capacitors before touching anything one is likely to "live long and prosper". Always be aware of which parts of your circuit are hot and which parts can store energy even after the power is cut off. Make it a habit to pick up that screwdriver and short everything after every run. Again, thankfully this circuit should be fairly safe since there aren't any large high-voltage caps. As serendipitor said about the antenna though, it should be placed where people/animals/vegetation can positively not contact it. I have an electric fence charger and it delivers 0.5J pulses at around 10KV, not terribly dissimilar to what you would experience should you contact the antenna. Any vegetation contact could lead to a fire hazard.

[tswift]

More experimenting today. Moving incrementally closer to Bruce's circuit. First is the R1 resistor. This is a 10M metal-film resistor, which is rated for fairly high voltage. These are commonly found as cap drain safety resistors on Tesla coil cap banks and other places.
http://gateway.ipfs.io/ipns/QmeamoEj...z/IMG_1558.JPG

Now I have essentially the entire front-end circuit built, up to the L1 coil. Here's what it looks like on the bench:
http://gateway.ipfs.io/ipns/QmeamoEj...z/IMG_1564.JPG

And a video of it in action. Watch as I adjust the tuning cap (which is C2 in the diagram, not C1 as I mistakenly said in a previous post). Observe the scope waveform on the screen.
http://gateway.ipfs.io/ipns/QmeamoEj...z/MVI_1562.mp4

The voltage in the circuit is enough to push the limits of the tuning cap at times:
http://gateway.ipfs.io/ipns/QmeamoEj...z/MVI_1560.mp4

And finally, I am going to try a different coil for L2 than the one I started with. That one had 80 turns, this one has 44, so I'll be starting off with a better step-down ratio. The loose coupling between the coils also reduces the induced voltage in L2 so it's not just as simple as computing the turns ratio. The lower inductance will require correspondingly more parallel capacitance to achieve resonance in the 500 KHz neighborhood, I haven't computed it yet. Off the cuff, perhaps 2-3 nF? Again, this is a coil I already had in the parts bin.
http://gateway.ipfs.io/ipns/QmeamoEj...z/IMG_1563.JPG

Here is a scope shot of the waveform with the L1 coil tuned to 500 KHz. There is a transient right at the spark, but after that it is a nice clean ring at the resonant frequency. The 10M resistor makes much more difference than I would have expected.
http://gateway.ipfs.io/ipns/QmeamoEj...antek612_1.gif

[soundiceuk]

I guess I might just join the party, as I have most of what is needed on hand from past experiments. I'm a long time radio enthusiast so I have wires and grounds already, and some high voltage broadcast transmitter parts to use. Some comments and questions about the circuit:

* I wonder about the antenna, which is approximately 1/4 wavelength at 500kHz, but will vary widely depending on height and soil conditions. An antenna modeling program shows the impedance of the antenna to be very low, just a few ohms. I don't know enough about the PPV, but I would hope that there is isolation from the very high impedance of L1 and C2 in resonance. Since this is apparently a spiky, nonlinear circuit, it is perhaps not relevant to match to the antenna in a conventional E/M sense. Also, my experience with RF transformers like this would say that C3 is probably extra. One side of the L1-L2 couple affects the other such that the whole is resonated with C2, and C3 would so strongly depend on C2 that it could be eliminated. The transformer ought to be ringing more or less continuously, so is operating in the conventional linear domain, as far as I can tell.

* A long wire as shown, low to the ground, with tens of kilovolts DC on it, is going to need an observer while in use. I would like to know more about the performance with height, as just a few meters higher, like the power lines, would be much safer. Anything that can come in contact with people or animals is not practical.

* Given this I wonder what the real requirement of the antenna portion is. If it is drawing ions towards it, then would not surface area be more to the point, as shown in Tesla's flat plate collectors? I guess only experiment will tell.

* Is there any data to indicate performance versus DC voltage on the antenna? I would guess it to be more or less linear, but maybe there is some sort of threshold. I have my doubts about putting very high voltage (>30kV) on something out in the weather (especially in rainy areas) as the need for extreme insulators becomes a limitation.

* What are possible alternatives to the PPV component that could give some sort of "foot in the door" testing? I would like to see something interesting before sending $100 off to Bruce. Is he actively making these valves now? One thing I would like to see is the waveform across D5. What are people using at this point? I am not familiar with fast recovery diodes at this voltage level, but would be able to try a string of lower voltage units which are on hand. Certainly the current demands are tiny, given the 10Meg resistor in series.

* I can't see that super caps are a real necessity. Either the circuit is making enough to send back to the HVM, or it is not. More capacity does not change things, unless there is a *highly* intermittent nature to the impulses. Conventional caps should do OK, if this is going to yield watts of power over time.

Best of luck in all your experiments. I have looked into Bruce's Yahoo group, but there does not seem to be much in the way of excitement there. As soon as I get any results one way or the other, I will post them here.

The super caps are necessary as the ions flow in surges, like waves of the ocean, some big, some small. More in day than night but never stops.

A balancer is recommended for the super caps.

If you haven't got the caps you can still light bulbs from L2 with high frequency brilliance.

[soundiceuk]

Serendipitor, is that your build in the picture?

Have you got a spark gap there? I can't make out all the components

Hey Tswift how are you getting on?

[serendipitor]

Yes, just testing the L1-L2 transformer for resonance, looks good. Next is to get the HV supply back together. I have various spark gaps I'll try, no worries there.

But I must say that having bright shiny copper for the antenna is a tall order, in this rainy climate. All my wire antennas get a surface corrosion over time. I'll clean up the wire initially, but it will not stay that way.

Tesla talked about polishing the surface of his plate collectors as well.

[Gedfire]

Do, NO TRY.

I see lasersaber is far more advanced than any other so called experts who have ever graced this forum.Yet this guy is ignored.

Me thinks this just needs a scaled up version.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1RXolkA08uk

[tswift]

OK, some progress. I got the antenna wire and the supercaps in today. I charged up the supercaps slowly from my bench power supply and checked the voltage on each on cap individually to make sure the balancing logic works. It's not perfect, apparently some of the caps have more or less capacitance but the differences are minor. I ran the PVM12 briefly off the charged caps to verify that that it works that way.

I also started the mechanical design and layout. I think the whole rig should fit in an existing weatherproof battery box I have that is about 30x30x12 inches. The box used to have deep cycle batteries from a small off-grid solar power system in it, but that was some years ago and the batteries all eventually went bad and got recycled. I didn't have $2000 for new batteries, so I decommissioned the system. Hopefully with this research I won't need deep cycle batteries ever again. I cut the baseplate from cheap 1/2" plywood, this will be more like a boilerplate rig than a really pretty build. It should at least look better than the jury-rig bench layout does. I also laid out and started cutting the end supports for the L1 coil, I think it makes the most sense to lay it out horizontally. My idea is something strongly resembling Don's "tabletop" rig, with the resonant coils in the middle, input circuitry on one side, and caps and output circuity on the other side.

As usual, I'll put full resolution versions of the pictures on IPFS but that takes a little while, so for now you can see the scaled versions immediately.

[tswift]

OK, here are the links to the full resolution pictures. I have noticed that with IPFS it takes a few hours for it to adequately replicate, a few other IPFS clients have to download the files and start seeding them before downloading them works well. It operates very much like bittorrent. If these don't work right away then come back and try again a few hours later and they should load.

http://gateway.ipfs.io/ipns/QmeamoEj...z/IMG_1548.JPG

http://gateway.ipfs.io/ipns/QmeamoEj...z/IMG_1568.JPG

http://gateway.ipfs.io/ipns/QmeamoEj...z/IMG_1569.JPG

http://gateway.ipfs.io/ipns/QmeamoEj...z/IMG_1570.JPG

http://gateway.ipfs.io/ipns/QmeamoEj...z/IMG_1571.JPG

http://gateway.ipfs.io/ipns/QmeamoEj...z/IMG_1572.JPG