( Links to all the pages will also be found at the bottom of each page.)
Electrostatics and Dirod #8
Introduction
One night in the fall of 2004, I crawled into bed in my T-shirt.. I was way too hot, so I sat up and peeled off my T-shirt in the dark. A lot of noise and bright discharges ensued. This had happened in times past, but this time I said to myself that it was time to pursue static electricity.
I started searching the web, and of course found many interesting sites. On one of these was a description of Jeremy Ahern's moving charge detector, which I promptly built and started using. It is interesting to see how pervasive static charges are. See:
http://www.ece.rochester.edu/~jones/demos/ahern.html
I also found reference to A.D. Moores classic book, "Electrostatics - Exploring, Controlling and Using Static Electricity" second edition, which now includes the "Dirod Manual". I obtained my copy from Barnes and Noble - this is a must-read book for any hobbyist interested in static electricity.
The Dirod is Moore's invention of one of the many types of electrostatic generators. I was intrigued, but it looked like it would be a lot of work to build any one of his several designs. Then, I found Kevin Dunn's "Caveman Chemistry" site, where he discusses his version of the Dirod generator. He sells a kit for his Dirod #8, which I bought and quickly assembled. Not only is it a pleasant machine to look at (my wife can attest to that), but it really works. I can draw 2 inch sparks with this generator. See the page "Dirod #8" for a picture of my Dirod.
There are many demonstrations that one can operate with the Dirod generator - Moore discusses more than 20 demos. I was attracted to the idea of building an electrostatic motor. Searching the web, I came across Jean-Louis Naudin's site, where he describes "The PFT Motor mk2". I was intrigued by his design, and built my own version. After operating this motor, I still have many questions about how it works. This led to some experimenting, which I describe in the section, "Electrostatic Motors", and following pages.
Harold Leinbach