WIRELESS WONDERS OF THE FUTURE.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXII, Issue 7056, 18 February 1910, Page 6

WIRELESS WONDERS OF THE FUTURE.

TESLA THE WIZARD ENERGY TO AUSTRALIA AND NEW ZEALAND. COMMUNICATION WITH MARS. ('•'Sydney Morning Herald's" Correspondent.)

NEW YOPJv, December 12. In the world of wireless achievement no name stands higher than that of Nikola Tesla, the famous inventor, who has his oflico in New York—an office that is guarded almost as jealously as tho palace of tho Czar of Russia. A quiet, reserved man, and withal, ono of the busiest men in all the world, he but rarely submits to the demands of the interviewer. Armed, howovor, with a letter from a friend of his, I succeeded in reaching him, and I found him greatly interested in Australia and New Zealand, so much so, indeed, that he hopes to visit those countries at no very distant date in connection with a groat electric scheme he is just perfecting, and which iH'omiscs to revolutionise life. Ho lias discussed his plans with Sir Joseph Ward in tiiis city.

Iho other day, in t-ko New York press, there was nublished a state ment that Tesla was perfeoting a systorn whereby it would be possible to telephone from New York city to Melbourne- by wireless process without any change in the present installations made by the telegraph and telephone companies; and it was with, a view to obtaining some details of this wonderful invention that I called upon him—and he save me the details of it, and greater wonders ,yet. What the world will be like in another twenty years, or oven in a decade, if all this man's prophecies be fulfilled, is almost unbelievable. Tesla looks the .wizard he is. Ho is remarkaby tall and thin, and he has a long, oval-shaped -head, with jot-black hair and moustache, slightly tinged with grey, and his eyes are small and dark, but wonderfully bright. He speaks with, a- pronounced foreign accent. His mother was a Montenegrin, his father was of French descent.

Tesla is planning to build a ,great electrio power plant, which will enable him to operate all the telephones, telegraphs, lighting, traction; and industrial systems of tho earth, by wireless currents. ,His plan also is so farreaching that it takes in the operation of all aeroplanes and dirigibles, and the keeping of them in. telegraphic and telephonic touch with the earth at all times by the same method, no matter over .what part of the earth they may be sailing, or with what part of it they may desire, to communicate. By this system, he says, all tho wires that are now used to connect telegraph and telephone instruments and_ electric lights will be eliminated without changing in any degree the other features of the installations, and it will be easier then for ■a man in New York to step- to a telephone, and converse by wireless with a. man in Melbourne, .Sydney, Auckland, or Wellington, than it now is for him to talk by wire across a room. Nor is this all. It will be possible for a man living in Australia or New Zealand to purchase a, small eleotrioaj device, capable of being carried in his pocket, wdiereby he may provide his house with all the lighting it requires, the power, being transmitted all the way from the .United States. .The price of this apparatus will be very small, -and the cost of lighting with, power derived from Niagara Falls; will be much less than whalt it costs your citizens for lighting at present. "For it only costs ten dollars per year to produce one-horse-power at Niagara," says Tesla. ENORMOUS ENERGY. "So .enormous," he added, "is the energy we can develop by means of my system—and I may say that Marconi, De Forest, and other eminent men in the sphere of electrical' science are working on my system —that it would be possible to cause a tremendous cataclysm on the earth with it. This power can be transmitted through tho globe in extraordinary quick time, and I can calculate to the millionth part exactly .the amount of power that •will be available .at any portion of the earth. I have already been'transmit ting energy to the coast of Western 'Australia., and I know to. a fraction of a second how long it takes to get there. All that will be necessary for 'the lighting of your cities, or to provide electrio power for any other purpose, even for airships when you have them out there, will be the erection of an inexpensive apparatus which,would 'receive the power we would send from Cfiagapa and then distribute it. "1 know," said Tesla, "thlat there are a great many people—and I have no doubt 'a large number in your own country, where the marvellous strides made in the harnessing of wireless currents aro not as fully appreciated as they are in this part of the world—who will 'consider my words as those of a visionary, but I am convinced that time will fully vindicate them. I have worked Ipersistently on the wire.leiss transmission of energy since 1893. In that year I presented a paper on tho subject before tho National_ Electric Light Association., in St. Louis and the Fra.niklin Institute in Philadelphia. It ,is popularly supposed that the wireless system o'f transmission is simply one invention, whereas it involves in its present state of perfection _ six fundamental discoveries, .or inventions, J in combination." These he stated asi follow:

, (1) The method and appara.tus_ for transforming ordinary currents into olectrioal oscillations .of great intensity.

(2) The apparatus for intensifying those vibrations immensely, so that they penetrate into the distance. (3) A receiving apparatus which col.leots and foenssos energy which a transmitter supplies to a large territory. "For instance, if such receiver, "properly constructed, be placed in Ireland, it will collect practically the entire energy conveyed to that country from the transmitter.

(4) The method and apparatus for making the electric impulses secret and non-interfer-able—that is to say, making it impossible to 2 reTen * their pas-

I sage Or to .read them. The energy of 'the transmitter, 'which is collected by the receiver, can only be released by a sort of safety lock or combination. (5) The .production of stationaa-y waves—that is, waves which excito the entire eiartlh and pass 1 through it .under ft vibration much tho same as though you wore to draw a string tight and it.hou strike it. With these wares the distance iis absolutely 'eliminated, as are the same whether the receiver is thousands of miles' away or close to the transmitter.

(6) A number of which, cannot well bo described in a short interview, but .which go together to make the system practically operative. NOT A THEORY, BUT A FACT. "As I tokl the representative of the 'New York Press,' " he continued, "it will be just as easy, with a plant constructed under tlio observance of these •principles, to telephone, from here to> Melbourne as across a room,.and there will be absolutely no distortion .of the voice, such as is now 'observable in communication by wire. It '.is no> theory this, but a fact, absolutely demonstrated by my experiment. These show that the current passes without Joss over the entire extent of the globe, amd through the globe. Already 1 have carried the construction of such an installation -very far, and B hope that I shall be able to complete it during the coming summer. From that moment every telegraphic and telephonic, as .well as every wireless Station, will be ever so much more valuable, as they will he able to receive messages from tany part of the world. All this will he done without the slightest change in the existing equipment." _ Asked if it Would be necessary under his plan to build high towers'' oni the shores of tlhe countries using it, and also in the interior, Testa, replied: "Not at all. The fact is thait largo towers are comparatively ineffective. Thlat which I have built near Port Vleffea*son, L. 1., is only 187 feet high, but the plaoit will produce ah effect which icon be pushed up to a irate of nioj less than 1,000,000,000 horse-power, which is more than all the wireless; plants that have been put up so far all together. I ' secured this enormous activity by the use of certain artifices, on which I have also based my confidence .that it will be possible to flash signals through inter-planetary space. A visionary, of course—until I do it. . "Now, I do not call all these inventions mine. I have simply laid the foundation. In the perfecting of my inventions grctat work has been done by the engineering staff of the Westing house and General Electric Companies. So that at the present time there are hundreds of .millions invested in enterprises in which my alternating system forms the underlying foundation. We have harnessed 6 000,000 horse-power waterfalls, and there are probably enterprises aggregating 20,000,000 more under consideration. When yon bear ,in mind th'at one horse-power for twenty-four hours is equivalent to the average performance of twenty-four men, you will realise the enormous importance of this water power. To put it another way—the 6,000,000 horse-power wMch we have harnessed has virtually added to" the world's population from the point of view of labour 144,000,000 of working men who consume no food land need no clothes." , ' * . TBSLA'S AIRSHIP.

TesTa then .went on fo refer to airsnips. One single plant, say, of 10,000 horse-power, would, he said, suffice .to drive several thousand flying machines, aeroplanes, and dirigjbles, anywhere in the world. While supplying thorn with wireless power, it would also keep them jn constant touch with the earth by wireless telegraph and telephone. "Of course," he said, "I have always considered as the .best solution of the problemof aerial flight the wireless transmission of power, because it dispenses with the necessity of carrying a heavy store of fuel, and makes the cruising radius anything one likes. The onry limitation would be the carrying of food and provisions. I have perfected a new scheme, purely mechanical, which I believe possesses very great advan. tages over' anything that has been done heretofore. I have produced a new kind of engine of great lightness and extraordinary simplicity, and have evolved new devices for lifting and propelling. A maohino on these new principles I have been designing during the past year, and I expect to begin construction very shortly. My machine will present absolutely no similaritv to any machine at present in existence. It will be extremely small and perfectly reliable. There will be less danger in flying by means of this machine than th'ero is in riding on an automobile, and it will require no skill or training such as the present areoplanea do. Every proposition involved in this new flying malchine has been demonstrated by me in actual experiments, so that the design is now a very simple matter." "How'much weight will it carry?" "Any weight you like. It is ainsply a question of size: and my machines will bo so powerful for their size that even machines of great power will bej small. It will bo possible by the use of this new engine of mine to develop, say, five horse-power for each lib of weight, while the best of the .present engines weigh something like lilb to 21b per horse-power." . SIGNALS TO MARS. Referring to inter-planetary oommunicirtion. Tesla said that in his experiments in Colorado, where he discovered certain planetary disturbances, he attained with hie transmitter activities which surpassed in power in many ways those of lightning. "In my present plant," ho went on. "I shall be able to reach a rate of energy delivery of about 1,000,000,000-horse-power. A simple calculation will convince any expert that such an intensity and energy reaching a certain area of the p)anot Sfars is ample to produce a perceptible effect

in a delicate instrument there. Of eourso we have not yet demonstrated in an absolutely certain manner tha<t there is life on Mars, but Professor Lowell has conclusively shown that the conditions are favourable to the maintenance of some kind of life. Personally, my conviction is strong that certain signals that I detected while experimenting with my wireless plant in Colorado in 1899 could not have emanated from any other planet except Mars. My reasons are too technical to exnlain them popularly, but when taken" all together they are very convincing. At any rate, we shall soon have an instrument in operation on this globe with which it will be possible to flash a signal to Mars, and we certainly are able to take their signals if they, on the other band, have perfected a similar scheme. 1 think they are flashing already, and are waiting for us to answer their signals." . . Tesla is convinced ihiait Mars is inhabited by 'a race of people quite as intelligent as the people of the earth, if not more so. "Mam is not the only Bering in the Infinite gifted with a mind," ho says. . ,

WONDERFUL FUTURE BEFORE US. In conclusion, Tesla painted a picture of tho future. "Man," said lie, "is tout just "beginriing to realise himself, but it -would Stagger the average man if I were to give -him a picture of tho earth as I see it (ten. twenty, and' thirty years hence. Tlho part that electricity is goring to play in human activities is simply enormous. From that moment when it was observed that, contrary to the established opinion, low and easily accessible strain! of t'he.latmosphere are capable of conducting eleobrioity, the transmission of electrical energy without wires became a rational task of tho engineer, and one surpassing all others in importance, ffs practical consummation means that energy will be available for the uses of man at any point of the globe, not in small'amolunts sudh as might be derived from the ambient medium. by suitable machinery,, hut in quantities virtually unlimited, from waterfalls. (Export of power will become tho ohief source of income fox many happi situated countries, -as the ■ United Btates, Canada. CteiJbral and South America, Sweden, Switzerland, and New Zealand. jVien will be able to dettle down, everywhere, fertilise and irrigato tho soil with little effort, and convert barren doseTto into gardens, and thus the entire globe can he transformed and in.-d'e a fitter ahode for mankind. It .s highly probable that if there are, as 1 believe, intelligent beings on Mars, they have long ago realised this very idea, "which would explain the chamiges on its surface noted Iby alstrontomers. • "A ship containing am electric circuit adjusted or 'tuned'; exactly to) electrical vibrations of the proper kind transmitted' to it from a distant ■. 'electrical oscillator,' -may be propelled and steered Iwithout any human . agency, save that necessary to work the distant plant. I liavo produced electric osoiUatioriß which were of such intensity that when circulating througlh my arms and chest tihey melted wires which joined my Wands, and .still I felt no "inconvenience. Same years ago. I intimated; my willingness ■to transmit through my body with very rapidly ■vibrating electric currents the entire electrical energy of the dynamos working at Niagara, - them amounting to 50,000 horse-power,, a power that has been greatly increased since,-then.

"Not only is communication to amy distance, without wires potesibler—there is every reason: to anticipate thaifc most telegraphic, messages across, the oceans will be soon transmitted without cables, and at linoomparably less expense than is now possible-—but • also the burning of the aibmobpheric nitrogen, tihe prodMcitlioin! of an efficient illuminant, and many other results of inestimable spiemtifio and' industrial Value. But the world 1 mores slowly, a«nd.new truths are difficult to see."