An ionic spinner works by ionised air in corona causing thrust on a wire but it needs DC to work well.
“Continue reading” for more details and photos.
High voltage applied to a wire will have a visible purple glow and fine sparks coming from the end. This is corona of ionised air. Being charged, it will stream away with a resulting small force. Balance a wire with a bend at the ends and it will start to rotate. Usually…
Observation 1: Medium Tesla coil doesn’t work.
In the photo above with a medium sized Tesla coil making 2 foot sparks (100 kHz AC) , the 14 foot arm above just didn’t move.
The rod above is finely balanced and can be spun through a full rotation with only slight finger pressure. The 14 foot (4.2 m) spinner rod turns on a 1 mm shaft and has low enough friction to drift in the wind. If there was even a slight force on it then it should turn.
Observation 2: DC 60 kV works
But a DC supply running perhaps 60 kV with 3 inch sparks works fine. This is powered by my voltage multplier.
The rod is electrically disconnected from the Tesla coil which is off. I have hooked up my 60 kV supply and on this time exposure of 36 seconds you can see the rod has rotated through at least 180 degrees (see the faint rod above my head which is briefly lit by the sparks that I made as it passed).
Observation 3: A small Tesla coil works
A briefcase Tesla coil works well. Here is a small symmetrical ionic spinner on top of my very small one with attached neon lights. It stops spinning when power is turned off and the lights go off.
Conclusion:
So DC and AC from a small Tesla coil work with an ionic spinner, but not AC from a large Tesla coil. How can this be explained?
Points from a small area of corona will ionise best with a negative electrode. Perhaps there is some rectification occurring here in the small TC. The larger TC might have more spark growth and less dependence on small point rectification.
Or perhaps the large TC has too much charged cloud to dissipate between cycling from positive to negative and back 100,000 times per second.
Ionic spinners (electrical whirl) have been described by Andrew Gordon, a Benedictine monk in 1745 who is also attributed with first describing Franklin Bells well before Franklin.
From my book of 1877: Popular Cyclopedia of the Natural and Physical Sciences, page 775:
Related pages
Ionic spinners – briefcase Tesla coil
Briefcase Tesla coilTry something else
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External links
Google+ (mine) Briefcase Tesla coil spinner. 23 comments.
Google+ (mine) Briefcase Tesla coil spinner
Photo Date: April 9, 2012, June 1, 2009