Tesla+Coils

//From: Optimusprime113 and physick.wikispaces.com//

==//__Creator of the Tesla Coil__//==


 * Nikola Tesla a renowned inventor, mechanical engineer and electrical engineer and is best known for developing alternating current (AC) electrical supply system.
 * Tesla was born in the Austrian Empire in July 1856 and later became an American citizen in July 1891.
 * Because of his 1894 demonstration of short range wireless communication through radio and as the eventual victor in the "War of Currents", he was widely respected as one of the greatest electrical engineers who worked in America.
 * He pioneered modern electrical engineering and many of his discoveries were groundbreaking.
 * In the United States during this time, Tesla's fame rivaled that of any other inventor or scientist in history or popular culture.
 * In 1886, Tesla formed his own company, //Tesla Electric Light & Manufacturing//. The initial financial investors disagreed with Tesla on his plan for an alternating current motor and eventually relieved him of his duties at the company. Tesla then worked in New York as a laborer from 1886 to 1887 to feed himself and raise capital for his next project. In 1887, he constructed a brushless alternating current induction motor, which he demonstrated to the //American Institute of Electrical Engineers// in 1888. In the same year, he developed the principles of his Tesla coil.
 * From 1893 to 1895, Tesla investigated high frequency alternating currents. He generated AC electricity of one million volts using a cone shaped Tesla coil and investigated the skin effect in conductors, invented a machine for inducing sleep, invented a cordless gas discharge lamp, and transmitted electromagnetic energy without wires, and built the first radio transmitter.
 * Tesla's theoretical work also formed the bases of wireless communication and the radio which is used today

A Tesla coil is a high voltage device. In its simplest form it is a hollow centred transformer driven by discharging a high voltage capacitor through a few primary turns. This sets up a high frequency resonance (the tendency of a system to oscillate at a greater amplitude at some frequencies than at others.) in the secondary coil. This resonance occurs between the inductance of the tall secondary coil and the capacitance (the ability of a body to store an electrical charge) of a rounded metal object (typically a donut shaped toroid) and a very high voltage results in streamers directly into the air or sparks to nearby objects.

//__How to Build a Tesla Coil__//
Well I'm not really sure how to build one but this website shows how to:

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//__Types of Tesla Coils__//

 * __Classic Tesla Coil__: Air core dual resonant transformer, this was the type of coil that Tesla created in the 20th century.The capacitor in the tank circuit is charged with a high voltage AC transformer. Periodically, when the capacitor has reached a certain level of energy, a simple spark gap breaks down to ionize a short plasma channel. This plasma channel conducts the power stored in the capacitor through the primary inductor in concentrated pulses. This happens over and over again. One way to think about this behavior is to imagine the effects of repeatedly hitting a bell with a hammer. The bell will ring louder and louder. As the energy increases energy is released into to the air creating lightning.
 * __Solid State Tesla Coil__: The semiconductor transistors and gates are used to replace the classic style spark gap, Expensive high power switching technologies exist that are capable of directly replacing the spark gap at classic voltages and currents. Because semiconductors heat up quickly, solid state Tesla Coils are often run in burst modes. The time between bursts is used to cool off the transistors


 * These are only two types of tesla coils there are many more but these are the most common.

//__What is a Tesla Coil used for?__//

 * Tesla first built his coil as a way to study high frequency electrical phenomena.
 * It is because of the tesla coil that advances in frequency were made such as frequency stability, selectivity, immunity to interference, and security of communications
 * it is used as sometimes in electro shock therapy and sometimes just as physics demonstrations.

//__Music???__//
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 * The tesla coil is not just a physics tool it is also a tool of music!
 * A tesla coil can release energy at such a high-frequencies that it can release sound waves
 * By changing the amount of power put into the tesla coil we can get different frequencies and different sound waves.
 * the first musical group to do a public preformance is called "ArcAttack"
 * this has also been used in the movie "The Sorcerer's Apprentence"

//References//

 * 1) Wikipedia, (May 28, 2012), []
 * 2) Tesla Downunder, (May 29,2012), [|http://tesladownunder.com/Tesla_coils_intro.htm#WhatIsTeslaCoil]
 * 3) GravityMagnet Invention Factory, (June 1, 2012), [|http://www.gravitymagnet.com/Layout2010/coils/coils.htm#tesla-coil]
 * 4) Twenty-First Century Books, (June 1,2012), []
 * 5) Unknown, (June 1, 2012), []
 * 6) Wikipedia, (June 1, 2012), []