MODERN JOVE.

Hawera & Normanby Star, Volume XLII, Issue XLII, 2 May 1922, Page 2

MODERN JOVE.

ELECTRICAL WIZARD HURLS THUNDERBOLTS AT WILL.

Schenectady has a modern Jove, who sits on his throne ma laboratory of the \ Ueneral Electric Company and hurls thunderbolts at will (wrote a correspond- j ent of the Springfield Republican;. ' He is Dr Charles P. Steinmetz, electrical wizard, who announced last month that he had succeeded in producing and ] controlling an indoor thunderstorm, with all the characteristics of its natural brother except the thunder clouds. At a demonstration of his "lightning, generator," the familiar forked tongues flashed through the laboratory with a deafening crash, splintered a large blockof wood, hurling the fragments 25 feet, and ripped a miniature tree from tip to base. The bolt carried the energy of 1,000,----000 horse-power— aoout one five-hun-dredth ot tne energy of "a natural lightning bolt, Dr Steinmetz .estimates—and I lasted for the one hundred-thousandth ! part ot a second., } Dr Steinmetz hopes his apparatus will ! contribute largely to the development of ! j lightning arresters, as it provides ah opportunity for the study at close range !of the phenomenon 'that .Benjamin | Er**>nklin began to investigate years ago i with his kite, string and key. His experiences have convinced him, however, that there is little likelihood of ' man's realising his dream of harnessing thunderbolts and making them work. Despite their tremendous energy, he says, their life is so short, that, har- ' nessed, they would be worth only a tew cents apiece. :

"In our lightning generator," he said. "we get a discharge- oS 10,000 amperes at over 100.000 volts, that is, a power ol over a million horse-power, lasting for a hundred thousandth part of a second. This gives tts the explosive, tearing and shattering of real lightning, so. that, for instance, a piece pi small tree^ exposed to tiie <liscnarue is mechanically torn to pieces.. A piece ot wire struck by the flash vanishes to. dust.

"The difference between lightning' energy and ordinary electric current is : similar to that between, a pound of dynamite and a pint of gasoline. The pint of gasoline contains more energy and can do more work than the pound of dynamite, but the pint of gasoline gives off its energy slowly, at a moderate ; rate of £ower, while the pound of dyna- j mite gives off its energy explosively, all | at once, at an enormous rate of powei, and thereby locally tears* and destroys." Dr Steinmetz's genera-tor consists essentially or a nigh voltage condenser, in the form of 200 glass plates. These are arranged in two rows, in groups of 50, and are capable of holding 120,000 volts of electricity. ' , On© end of the double- row of condensers corresponds to the thunder cloud in the sky. in which an electric current is gradually stored up and increased by the conglomeration of the rain drops, as Dr Steinmetz has shown. The other end of | the condenser plates corresponds to theearth. i When the tension of ?the stored elec- ! trie energy becomes greater than the I condenser will hold, the discharge takes ! place. The lightning flash is seen, the ' thunder rolls —represented by a loud* j snapping sound —and the bolt strikes.