Argon Tube Power Source

[AbbaRue]

In 1995,96 a couple from Concord, Ontario, Canada filed 3 Patents on a device they had constructed. The US. Patent numbers are:
#5,416,391 #5,449,989 #5,502,354
This device uses an argon filled vacuum tube with Aluminum plates,spaced 2 to 6 cm apart.
An input of about 600 volts DC causes an ablormal discharge to take place between the plates. This abnormal DC discharge, causes the Argon atoms to give off an AC ripple voltage. Like the ripples you get from throwing a rock into a pool of water. The only difference is that the AC ripple given off, has an amperage many times greater then the DC amperage needed to cause the discharge. The input DC amperage is typically less then 1 amp, but the AC ripple has been measured at greater then 150 amps. The AC ripple is also a little lower in voltage then the DC, somewhere around 2/3 the input voltage. Simple math. Power = Voltage X Amperage.
Input 600 Volts X 1 Amp = 600 Watts.
Output 400 Volts X 150 Amps = 60,000 watts.
But more typically the output Amperage is about 10 times the input:
So Output 400 Volts X 10 Amps = 4000 watts.
4000 / 600 = 6.6666666
And taking into acount power losses in the system we get about 5 times as much power out of this thing as we put in.
I built one my self and tested it. I use a 40 watt lightbulb in series with the input as a limiting resistor so my 3A diodes won't fry.
I isolate the AC out from the DC in by using 2 "3.5 mfd AC" caps hookup up in series with each of the 2 lines. I then rectified this output AC using a bridge rictifier, and use it to charge a 450volt electrolytic cap. I have another 40 Watt lightbulb connected across the electrolytic cap.
This output DC lights the 40 watt lightbulb up nice and bright while the input limiting 40 watt ligh bulb barely even glows at all. Any of you that know your electronic theory, know that this couldn't be possible unless the output wattage is higher then the input wattage. Because if you hook 2 x 40 watt lightbulbs up directly in series they would both light up equally bright. And this Argon tube is hooked up in series with the one lightbulb.

Now anyone wanting to build there own:
The tube needs a variable DC power supply capable of delivering 750 Volts. at less then 1.5 amps. So it's quit easily to construct. I made mine using a 35 volt power transformer connected through a variac to an old microwave transformer (those things boost the voltage 18 times), I then used 400 volt diodes connected as a bridge rectifier.
I got my vacuum pump from EBay for about $150. I leased an argon tank from a local BOC welding supply company. The lease is $65/yr and it costs $50 for the argon. I don't have glass blowing equipment, so I just used a pickle jar with a brass valve mounted on it. And 2 wires going through the lid. You can figure out your own methode for this part. I am still working on a better design for the vacuum chamber. These high-tech fusor chambers on this site would work purfectly for this as well. I just threw something together quickly just to see if it would work. Glass blowing can get expensive, so I am still looking for a good cheap alternative for the chamber. The patent states that SS plates work too. Copper and brass are supposed to be the worsed plate materials. I haven't done any tests yet on other materials, because I managed to get one pickel jar chamber to work really well and hold a good vacuum for me, so I don't want to take it apart. But I am trying to get another one working well too.
So if anyone else finds this an interesting project, maybe this can form a new section for this forum. The source of the excess electricity is still unknown, and it is suggested that it is ZPE. It could be a form of fuson as well, more tests need to be done. But I know it works, I seen it with my own eyes, and it has me really exited.
I used to work as an Electronics Tech. fixing TV's and VCR's so I have a good foundation in electronics and Ohms law, and this device is definately putting out a lot more electricity then what I'm putting in.
When I hook 2 lightbulbs up in series with my 600 volt power supply the variac gives off a loud buzzing sound and the bulbs both light up equally bright. But when I run the discharge tube, the input series bulb barely glows, the variac runs quiet, and the output bulbs lights to full brightness. This is definitely a new source of direct power. The patent holders have drawings on how to run electric motors with this AC pulse. By varying the pulse rate you can vary the motor speed. This is awsome technology. I believe if you hook up two of these using the one to run the other you could use the output of the second unit to run the first unit, all that it would need is a
"full wave voltage doubler" connected to the outputs of each. I don't see how one could run itself just because of the wireing conflicts, but if someone can come up with a way for the output to run the input let me know. I thought of transformers, but that will cause to many power losses, transformers are far from 100% efficient. Voltage doubler would be the best way to go. I want to try it but I only have one 450 v electrolytic right now, and I need to buy some more.
The Electrolytic I'm using is 450 Volts 2400 mfd. but a much lower value should work. You can hook up the lightbulb directly to the AC passing through the AC caps but because the pulses are so short and high the lightbulb filiment doesn't have time to heat up thus the reason for converting it to DC and charging a cap with it. Caps store high current very well thats why you need limiting resistors in series with caps or you will blow brakers turning things on. Caps act as dead shorts across a power supply when they are completely discharged.
One last point, the ideal vacuum seams to be 0.8 Torrs. but anything around this value works well. I don't have a high-tech Torr meter so I just leave the chamber connected while I pump it down and when it starts discharging nicely, I close the valve and turn the pump off.

Look forward to hearing from others on this forum, I thought it fit well with this forum, because of all the High Voltage and Vacuum Tube Technology going on at this site, and this may be a form of fuson as well.

Till Later Harold

[Richard Hull]

I gotta' get busy on this one. I need to go off the grid. I'll bet that the capacitive bridge rectifier and capacitor can boost the voltage up to at least 1.414 times the input. With that much ZPE in the system, I don't know why I haven't had one years ago. Thanks.

Richard Hull

[Retric]

My guess is that the output Amperage spikes over time so that most
devices giving single Amperage output numbers give an incorrect
average reading.

Anyway, it’s easy enough to test if this is going on use the output
power to run to generate heat via a resistor. If you are really
generating 6.6x input power your going to though off a lot more heat. I
would do this in a stove as 600 Watt’s is a lot of heat and you can
easily find out what temperature the stove gets and how long this
takes over a few few runs that run for progressively longer.

AKA:
run 1 = Power > device > resister over 10 seconds.
run 2 = power > resister over 10 seconds.
run 3 = Power > device > resister over 20 seconds.
run 4 = power > resister over 20 seconds.
run 5 = Power > device > resister over 30 seconds.
run 6 = power > resister over 30 seconds.
...

[Alex Aitken]

Richard has rather cunningly pointed out one reason the 'output' bulb would glow brighter than the 'input' bulb without any other power input. Filement bulbs are something of a bad measure of power anyway, as when cold they have a much lower resistance than when hot.

These devices are 10 a penny, using bulbs is a new one on me, but measuring currents and voltages and working out input and output 'power' is very easy to self delude. The key point at which they all fail though, is any attempt to power the input soley from the output.

[Starfire]

some reading on it

http://www.rexresearch.com/correa/correa.htm

[Richard Hull]

These are very specific claims and very specifically tested by Scott Little at Earth Tech and shown to be BELOW unity.

I had an opportunity to chat with Scott last week. (related to data logging and some A to D work I was about) Near the end of the long phone call, I asked if he had seen one single new energy device tested by earth tech that even produced near unity in electrical output. He chortled gently so that it was barely audible and said. " No, nothing yet and we are doing them regularly."

The work of the Correas and others has really been put through the ringer and found wanting in the COP arena which is what traditionally "feeds th' bull dog".

Richard Hull

[DaveC]

For most of the over unity claims I evaluated at the electric company, the instrumentation hookup was THE problem. It is not easy to tell the enthusiastic entrepreneur that his measurement scheme would get a failing grade in any undergraduate electrical engineering course.

When your instrumentation saya you are getting more out than you put in, you look for errors, because somewhere out there you have made one or more.

Pulsed, cyclical and DC plus AC currents and voltages take some careful attention to detail, in order to get the meters to tell the truth.

With circuits like a gas discharge circuit, it could be tricky getting consistent readings.


Dave Cooper

[Richard Hull]

Most over unity claims are found by their inventors with DVMs and multimeters. They often use as many as ten of them hooked to various portions of their circuitry. (as if quantity of such intruments is a measure of accuracy). This, of course, is unacceptable among non-linear, sparking, gas discharging, popping, sputtering, brissant processes with normal sensors and transducers.

Only special, carefully monitored, time ordered and integrated high speed data logging setups can hope to tell the tale here coupled with sensors and transducers with specs designed to repond within the times, pressures and shocks sent to them.

Hanging two nice $300.00 Fluke DVM's off a circuit to read volts and amps just won't cut it unless what you are doing is DC and runs as smooth a cat's purr. Oddly, no over unity device claim has a process that purrs, but instead, moves and acts in fits and spurts. Just the thing that few home brew basement inventors or even many labs are prepared to evaluate.

Such efforts not only require the "right stuff" in the way gear, but also on the part of the person using it.

Richard Hull

[AbbaRue]

I haven't been using meters to measure the various currents. I just know from my experience in Electronics, that if you hook two lightbulbs up in series you can't get one to glow bright while the other barely glows at all. If someone can give me a circuit example that will allow a bulb in some fancy circuit to glow brightly while the series current limiting bulb stays almost unlite at all, please tell me how you can do that. In electronics we learn that the current leaving a circuit is always equal to the current entering the circuit.

In any case, any of you that have vacuum chambers ready to go. Try this one out for yourself, it's quite easy to construct.

[AbbaRue]

I've been doing some experimenting with different metals, and different sizes of plates, and I found that aluminum is still the best metal for the plates. Also a larger plate, even though it doesn't seem to put out more current, it works better because heat dissipation is important.
As soon as the plates become silent, and just glow with a purple glow, you no longer have abnormal discharge, and the system uses more power to run than it gives off. In order to have the excess power output you must have a loud buzzing sound coming from the plate discharge.
For my latest tests I used 1 inch aluminum pipe with an aluminum eaves trough spike through the center. The spike is about 1/4 inch thick. This seems to work really well.
I ordered some 400 volt 470mfd caps and and some 1000 volt 6amp diodes, hope to get them by monday, then I can test the voltage doubler out. I want to see if one tube can run another, if so then I can see building a system that sustains itself. My biggest problem is still getting a portable discharge tube built that keeps it's vacuum, without glass blowing.

Till later Harold.

[DaveC]

Harold -

You do need instrumentation in your circuit to make any sense out what it happening. When you have plates in a partial vacuum, (low pressure chamber) you have a "series" circuit of a rather differen sort, than in a simple wired series circuit with resistive components.

As to lamps in series, one glowing, and one not, are they identical lamps, and do they actually glow with equal brilliance when your meter shows an identical DC current flowing through them. Many times, mysteries in electronics are the result of assumptions which are not checked for accuracy.

Just take your time to make very careful measurements with instrumentation that you understand. I am reminded by this of a lab experiment I used to have my classes do early in the year. It consisted of simply measuring Sine wave AC , square waves, and pulsed signals with Analog, Digital meters and an Oscilloscope. Most were surprised at the amount of error, the meters showed when the frequency was higher than powerline frequency, and when the waveshape was not either DC or sinewave.

To make sense out of current and voltage signals where there are or may be pulses and or sharp changes in amplitude, you should always take readings with an oscilloscope, which has enough bandwidth (frequency response) to easily resolve the rise or fall times of the signals. Then by triggering the sweep to show all signals realtive to each other, one can then approximate a full cycle calculation of volt amps, real and reactive power. Without doing this you are really whistling in the dark.

I am certain that properly done, your measurements will show energy is being conserved, and the laws of physics are intact.

Dave Cooper

[Starfire]

AC measurements are not simple nor easy to make accurately,

Phase angle between voltage and current plays an important part in AC analysis. It is common to have a watt-less generator occuring when a pair of matched supply alternators are paralleled for power sharing - one set runs hot and takes double load from the other which stays cool and is watt-less, even when both sets are running together and connected in parallel to the same load.
This occurs with a high inductive reactance load and bad PFC being presented to the generator pair and is why utillity power companies charge a very high tariff for poor Power Factor Correction on inductive reactance loads. They require clients to provide PFC with capacitors at the inductive load source to correct phase angle difference between current and voltage so produced, to prevent problems of watt-less generation at the power station running parallel alternator sets.

Can a similar condition exist in your experiment? which may be in parasitic oscillation with unbalanced load sharing, though a positive feedback gain element does not seem apparent from your description of the operating conditions.

Has AC Phase shift and frequency also been measured for both loads?

A few photos would help.

[Alex Aitken]

One very simple example that violates the '2 bulbs' method would be to connect a 12v halogen bulb in series to the primary of a step down transformer 'the input', and a second 12v halogen bulb to the secondary. For an AC input the bulb on the secondary will glow brighter even though the 'power' is first passing through the first bulb. The reason here is pretty obvious, the step down transformer boosts the current. In terms of AC analysis, the transformer is boosting the impedence of the second bulb (by the turns ratio squared) and you now have a low impedence bulb in series with a high impedence bulb, the latter of which will then dissupate the most power.

A second example, closer to home would use a spark gap, similar to a tesla coil circuit, 2 bulbs and capacitor. Aranged in series AC1 - Bulb - Bulb - Capacitor - AC2, with the spark gap connected between the 2 bulbs and between the capacitor and the AC connection. At the start of the AC cycle we'll trace what happens, rising voltage starts to charge the capacitor with exactly the same current passing through both bulbs. The current drops as the capacitor catches up with the crest of the applied voltage and set properly this is when the spark gap fires. With the gap closed for a very short period of time the capacitor dumps its energy into *just* the second bulb. So the second bulb gets everything the first bulb gets, plus all the stored energy in the capacitor. This second example is imperfect for a lot of reasons, for a start the power supply must be current limited or have an inductor in the circuit, otherwise the shorting of the spark gap puts the whole power supply over the 'dim' bulb, but my point stands I think. Under the right conditions this circuit will aparently generate power from nothing, judged purely from the behaviour of the bulbs.

[AbbaRue]

I had my friend video tape me while I did a demo of my discharge tube.
I made 3 videos 2 are 95 megs long and the 3rd is 143 megs long. I would like to upload them to this forum for others to see but because of the size maybe there to big; But here is a picture I captured of the discharge tube at work. The bright light on the left is the 40 watt light bulb glowing at full brightness, and the little glowing spot above my left hand is the limiting 40 watt bulb barely lite up. Directly lined up with the middle of the couch the purple looking jar is the discharge tube I built using a hot peppers jar and two aluminum plates about 1.5 cm apart.
The limiting 40 watt bulb is a small clear pointed bulb. I used the clear bulb so I could see the filiment light up. A regulare frosted bulb wouldn't give off enough light to see the filiment most of the time. I tryed hooking the 2 lightbulbs up together in series to this same power supply and they both lite up exactly the same brightness, but the variac gave off a very loud buzzing sound, I could tell it was well over worked by doing that.
In this picture while the bulb was fully lite up there is almost no sound at all coming from the variac, so I know very little power is being drawn from it. I will say this again, I have a very good, sound background in electronics. I worked as an electronic tech. for over 2 years fixing TV's and VCR's. I also am a very strong skeptic, and most free energy claims I have looked at are just a lack of knowledge in electronics, for example many people don't understand that when you first hook a capacitor up to a power supply, it acts as a dead short for a fraction of a second, and draws a vary large amount of current, that is why you need current limiting resistors in series with large caps or you will blow something. Another common lack of knowledge is in transformers. Many people don't know that when you boost the voltage you lower the current, and vise-versa. So high voltage devices seem to use very little current, so they think it's saving energy.
But I have studied this device in great detail. That limiting lightbulb should be glowing just as bright as the output bulb. The only capacitors I am using are the 2 AC caps which isolate the AC going to the output bulb from the DC used for the discharge tube. The output bulb is hooked up in parallel with the discharge tube. And the discharge tube is hooked up directly to the bridge rectifier. I tried hooking the output bulb up directly with the bridge rectifier, and the limiting bulb glows as bright as the output bulb, and then the variac starts buzzing very loud because of the large current drain on it. I tried hooking just one bulb up directly to the microwave transformer, and the bulb barely lights up and the voltage drops to about 28 volts, just like short circuiting it. I have analised this circuit over and over again, and it just doesn't add up. You can't pass enough current through that limiting light bulb to light the output bulb without lighting the limiting bulb up equally as much. The AC caps are only 3.5 mfd caps, and they don't even store enough power to keep the bulb lite for 1 second.
I had this thing running for an hour one evening and the bulb kept brightly lite. With all the knowledge I have, I know there is excess energy here. The patent holders have done extensive measurements of this device, and if you download there patents you can read about there detailed measurements. I don't need to buy expensive equipment just to repeat there measurements. I have no reason to doubt there findings. Any skeptics out there please download the three patents and read them.
Here is another copy of them #5,416,391 #5,449,989 #5,502,354 .
Just type them into google and download them. They use this discharge tube as a motor control unit, for a variable speed AC motor.
This circuit can be fine tuned to control the speed of an AC motor.
They run the tube from a high voltage battery array and then rectify the output and use it to charge another battery array of discharged batteries, and they did intensive measurements and graphed them.
The power drained from the input batteries runing the tube was much lower then the power they stored charging the other battery array.
So if you want measurements read the patents.
Paulo N Correa has a PHD in physics, and he was very detailed in his measurements, and in the construction of the tubes. He even searched for the source of the excess power in the aluminum that was vapourised from the plates, and even those measurements didn't account for the massive excess energy they got.
I am personally completely convinced that this tube works, and for a skeptic like me to be this convinced is incredible in itself. As I said in my previous post, I ordered some 400 volt 470 mfd caps. and some 1000 volt 6 amp diodes, I hope to get early in the next week. Once I have those parts, I plan on building a full wave voltage doubler, and hooking that up to the output. Then I will try running another discharge tube off the output. If I can do that and get the same brightness from the output, I should be able to use the output from the second tube to run the first tube. Then I will just disconnect the power supply going in and have a self sustaining circuit. ONCE I have accomplished that, it will be interesting to see what the skeptics have to say then.
This is a very exciting moment for me, and I hope others will test the device out for themselves. In any case I will seek to keep you informed as to my progress. I would like to share the videos with others, but because of the size I don't know if I can upload them to this forum, I already tried and the reply I sent didn't get posted. I don't know if that is because all uploads are checked before posting them or what.


Here is a picture captured from the video anyway.
The output bulb on the left, is so bright you can't even make it out on the video, whereas the limiting resistor bulb is hardly noticable on the right, above my left hand. The pickle jar discharge tube is lined up directly with the middle of the couch, suspended on the vacuum pump. See it's purplish glow?

Till Later Harold.

[Starfire]

Harold - a circuit and drawing of your device? -

The only other system I know, which will provide for two lamps on the same circuit having different loading ( brightness ) is with a standing wave on a transmission line fed from a high frequency high power transmitter. ( with a power output level such as to light the bulbs. )
A feeder to a miss-matched radio antenna or miss-matched load, will have nulls and peaks along its length, due to the standing wave - a bulb connected across a null point on such a pair of feeder wires, which may be simply two parallel wires, will not light up when powered from a suitably powered transmitter. - but a second bulb further along the same pair of feeder wires at a peak point, will light full bright. - If the transmitter is connected to the feeder pair through a antenna matching unit and the tunning/loading is played with, you can light up either or both simply by playing with the tuning and frequency of the transmitter. - Both bulbs on the same circuit will apparantly behave differently.

Your report and experiment is worthy and bears further investigation, if only to establish understanding and compliance with physical laws or otherwise. A more detailed circuit and drawing will allow a duplicate to be built and tested by an independant and will provide support and confirmation of your work.

Thank you for the report.

[AbbaRue]

Here is a diagram of the circuit. It is extremely simple, not much room for strange currents or voltages. I mean this is it!!! 2 lamps, 2 AC caps, 1 discharge tube, 1 bridge rectifier. Awsomely Simple!!!


Till Later Harold.

[AbbaRue]

Did some more tests on sunday evening.
I tried using a peice of 1 inch galvanized pipe, 5 inches long, with the evestrough spike down the center, using wooden spacers.
After a few runs the tube started working good, I guess it took a while for the argon to get into the pipe. I placed the pipe into a vacuum jar with a tap connected to the top and 2 wires going through the lid.
This is real low tech. I then connected the wires to the pipe and spike.

Anyway, once the tube was working well, I connected a 60 watt bulb up to the output, and it light up full brightness just like the 40 watt bulb.
So I got out another light fixture and connected it up in parallel with the other output fixture. Then I placed the 40 watt into the second fixture. I had both lights going. So I pulled out a 250 watt heat lamp I had sitting around and I hooked it up in place of the 40 watter. So I had a 60 watt and a 250 watt bulb hooked up together, and they both lite up fine.
The most interesting discovery was that when I screwed the 250 watt bulb in with the 60 watt bulb (total 310 watts) the input limiting bulb didn't budge, it stayed lit up exactly the same brightness. I tried unscrewing the bulbs and screwing them in again a few times and there was a change in the limiting bulbs brightness, it went even darker sometimes when I connected the second bulb up. That surprised me, because I would have expected the limiting bulb to get brighter not darker.
You can see the diagram from my last post. Maybe someone can come up with some more explanations as to what is happening here, but I know this is a new source of energy.

The main change is that the arcing in the discharge tube becomes a little louder. It appears that the Aether is supplying the energy as I need it. The more I need the more it provides. I need an adapter for my pump to take the 1 inch piping down to the size of the pump hookup. So tomorrow I plan on getting a pipe reducer fitting, and then I can connect the discharge tube up directly to the pump without using the vacuum jar. I will put a plastic pipe cap on the other end of the tube with a hole drilled in it for the spike to go through. Then I will epoxy the nail to seal it good. The other end of the pipe is going to be screwed into a 3/4 inch valve that connects to the pump. So without using the leaky vacuum jar I should be able to keep the vacuum intact.
I'm really excited after seeing the 250 watt heat lamp light up without effecting the brightness of the limiting bulb.
From all my observations thus far, I have noticed one very conclusive observation. No matter what I hook up to the output, it has very little effect on the current limiting bulb. The discharge tube only draws the amount of power it needs to cause the discharge to take place. Then no matter how much power you draw off the tube in AC the discharge current remains the same. An arc is an arc. The distance between the plates and the heat of the plates is the only thing effecting the current needed to run the tube. Only the negative plate gets hot, and it slowly gets eroded away as the matal vapourizes little by little. The positive plate remains relatively unchanged, except for the metal being deposited on it from the negative plate. I'm using the outside pipe as the negative, because of 2 factors. The larger size so there is more metal to erode away and the larger size radiates the heat more efficient.
I also connected the output AC to a stove top heating element, and caused it to get hot. But the element is a 250 volt element so it took a while to heat up, I then connected the 60 watt bulb up across the heating element and the bulb still lights up. I still have some more tests to do, and so far my most challanging problem has been maintaining a good vacuum. I don't like having to keep the vacuum pump running steadily, while doing the tests.
But this problem should be solved with the discharge pipe connected directly to the pump through pipe adapters.
So till next time keep up the good research.
Harold.

[DaveC]

Harold -

I think you are missing the evidence that the circuit presents to you.

The left hand lamp lights barely at all. This means very simply that there is little voltage drop across it. The majority of the voltage drop is across the bridge circuit. The right hand lamp lights brightly in series with two capacitors while being shunted by a gas discharge lamp. This tells us that the second lamp has a large voltage across it. It does not tell us anything about the voltages (and phase) across the capacitors and the argon lamp.

In order to make sense of this you need to know the current through each component and the associated voltage drop across it.

But you also need the time relationship of each of all these values, because with a gas gap which fires at a particular voltages, the non linear resistance of the lamp's filament, and the two capacitors' charging currents, plus the bridge rectifier's half cycle behavior, you have a stew of things going on.

This is the stuff of many kinds of switching circuits especially where you have high voltage discharge lamps, and their capacitive firing circuits. Getting physically correct results takes careful setup and execution. PhD's, well grounded in electrical enegineering, will not get this wrong.

I would suggest borrowing a good 4 channel digital oscilloscope ( analog would also work, but won't do the math for you), two good probes, and a couple of current transformers (toroids with 10 T of wire would also work.. but calibrate first)... The measurements can get dicey because there will be some serious time phase differences at the various components, which will make determining true power a bit tricky.

It IS rather complex to sort out, but when properly done, power out will be a respectable fraction of power in. You will have some "fun" doing it.

Interesting stuff!!

Dave Cooper

[Alex Aitken]

Harold, read my second example of the 2 bulbs. It is extremely similar to your circuit and I pulled that out of my head without really trying.

You have a tank circuit that when the argon tube fires dumps all the energy in the capacitors into the second bulb. The first bulb is a measure of the current the equipment draws, the second the total energy in the capacitors. All the system does is compansate for the impedence of the second bulb and the higher the voltage you run it from, the lower the value of capacitors for a given stored power (and thus the less the first lamp will glow due to reduced current) the more impressive it will seem.

[Starfire]

Can't read component values Harold - Is the AC input direct off
mains or the MOT via a variac (Variable transformer )

I think you need at lest a volt meter across each load and a current meter in series with each load to make any sense of this.

[Richard Hull]

Without going into to much detail. You basically have a maximized current flowing through the right lamp for larger slices of time.

On the right side, the two capacitors are not needed and a single 1.75ufd capacitor will give the same result. The bridge is attempting to feed the capacitors at a 120hz rate not a 60hz rate. The capacitors attempt to charge as the sine rises. It is well known that the current in such a circuit is maximum. So the lamp is recieving maximum current through it and, as the sine rises, the capacitors charge proportionally. and the lamp lights. At some point in the sine, the argon tube fires and acts as a short. The capacitors now act as a source of low impedance voltage which supplies maximum voltage on discharge keeping the lamp current up. This effectively gives a maximized current at voltage to the right lamp over the bulk of each 120hz input sine. (RC circuit). When the tube stops firing on the bak side of the sine the caps attempt to charge even on the falling voltage and current to the lamp continues to zero and immediately picks up again.

The lamp on the left side is actually a current limiter to the variac you are using and is only attempting to see a maximized current when the argon tube is dishcarging, unfortunately, the inductance of the variac or the pole transformer is in very high and on a short, the current lags the voltage in a sine transient. All the voltage appears across the inductor and not the lamp, robbing the bulb on the left of current it needs to stay lit brightly. (RL circuit)

Basically the thing is charging as an RLC circuit with double the R ..... (Two bulbs in series). But when the argon fires. The bulb on the right is fed by the RC circuit while the bulb on the left is now handled as an RL circuit and starved for current at a critcal period when the argon tube fires. There probably a similar function going on with the dynamic resistance changes of the filaments, too. (they are not 360 ohms when at various temperatures.)

As Dave notes, this would all be made manifest only with a four channel scope or a four channel high speed A-D data logger as you see the time ordered power delivery in this horrible mix of sometimes RL, sometimes RC, sometimes RLC and constant dynamic R changing mish mash of circuitry.

It is important to note that there is no L in the right bulb's discharge path once the argon tube fires. Changing the value of the charging cap will see the circuit dynamics change amazingly.

The whole thing is a function of the dynamic filament resistance and reactive circuitry. The energy apparently GAINED on the right side in a very hot filament is a sign of energy Lost on the Left side in the rectifiers and L which never hit the left bulb.

The thought that a Phd is needed here is not the case. People getting B.S.E.E and even two or three year A.S. E.E. degrees are dragged through the torments of reactive circuitry and temperature coefficients of resistance. So a good EE technician can even see through this one.

The energy that didn't make it to the lamp on the left got lost in the inductance of the variac or pole transfromer (also on the left). It is not a case of more energy appearing in the circuit on the right, but more energy appearing in the LAMP on the right.

Richard Hull

[AbbaRue]

I built 4 vacuum tubes today and have been testing them. I bought some 100 Watt bulbs today, and am using one of them as the output test bulb.
The 100 Watt bulb lights to full brightness and the limiting bulb is still barely lighting up.
The 4 tubes I built are all made from 1 inch piping with an aluminum spike down the center. I made 2 aluminum, 1 galvanized, 1 black steel gas pipe. The galvanized and black steel pipes work well but they get hot and go into glow mode. The aluminum pipes dissipate the heat better so they keep working in discharge mode longer.
You see when the discharge tube goes into glow mode the negative plate gets a purple haze of plasma around it, and almost no AC power is created. I believe this is why this new energy source wasn't discovered earlier, because neon tubes are designed to operate in plasma mode to give off the pretty coloured lighting. When the tube operates in discharge mode it gives off a farely load buzzing sound and there is almost no light given off by the tube, you just see an arcing across the plates. It's this arcing that produces the AC current that I'm taping into. Now I'm not the researcher that is doing the high tech measurements to prove this tube works as a source of free energy. That research has been done by the patent holders, and the research findings are available for your study on there website, they have whole ebooks available on there website for free downloading if any skeptics out there want the scientific proof. I have no reason to doubt there measurements. I'm not interested in proving or disproving this technology, but just like others on this forum that are building fusors, and testing them, I am building these discharge tubes and testing them. I was hoping for others on this forum to maybe join me in this adventure and build some tubes of there own. So we could share our findings, if someone wants to be a skeptic and try to come up with theories about this discovery, I would suggest you email the patent holders, they are the ones who have done the detailed research and taken the detailed high tech measurements. I have done a search on the internet, and I haven't come across any technical rebuttals about this technology yet. In any case here is the link to the Correa website were all the research info can be found. I don't have the money or facilities that this couple has, so I have no intentions on doing indepth measurements in it. I am interested on perfecting my own discharge tubes and utilizing the access energy. Here is the link to there website: http://www.aetherometry.com/

Now, the replies I really look forward in seeing are from others that are considering building there own version of this discharge tube, so we can exchange info, and solve construction problems. I still haven't come up with a good way to seal these vacuum tubes, so I can remove them from the pump, and use them alone. I want to expariment with what happens when I run 2 tubes in parallel with each other, the interaction between them should be interesting. Also what will happen when 2 tubes are connected in series with each other.
There are a lot of interesting expariments to do. I didn't get my diodes and caps yet, so I am still limited. Hope they arrive soon.

One final note: According to your theories on this circuit, we can cheat the utility company, because the way they monitor how much power we consume in our homes is by connecting a small electric motor in series with the power entering our homes, and just like my limiting resistor bulb the electric motor turns according to the current traveling through it. Only instead of producing light it poduces motion.
Just a thought for you skeptics.
Till later Harold.

[DaveC]

Harold -

Suggest you go read up on how a watt-hour meter actually works. It is NOT in series with the voltage... it has two sets of windings, and produces a rotating magnetic field that drags the spinning disk around in direct proportion to the product of volts time current times the cosine of the phase angle between them.

Your system will not "fool" it. Trust me (or not ) on that one.

Not to belabor the point, but your mention that the discharge tubes are actually arcing... not a real glow discharge... means that you will have some seriously noisy currents and voltages to measure.. It will take some very careful setup to get the right answers.

But.. there is no energy being made here.. only energy being consumed.

Dave Cooper

[Starfire]

Dave - utility meters are easy fooled. A 25va transformer with a mains coil and a 6mm 2 turn secondary winding connected antiphase across the live (outside) terminals will run the wheel back - A guy in Belfast was successfully prosecuted for electric theft when a meter inspector visited his home to take a meter reading and recorded a lower reading than the previous one - it could only happen in Ireland. An adjustment to far.

[Alex Aitken]

Harold, if you look at Richards and my explanations, which are essentially the same, you will see exactly why the argon gap must be in 'spark gap' mode, not glow mode for the second lamp to be brighter.

You are not getting out more power than you are 'measuring'. You are just using the tesla coil time compression trick to raise the effective impedence of the second bulb. So it glows brighter. Study the tank circuits of tesla coil designs, they charge a capacitor over half a cycle, and then discharge through a few turns of air coil. Without this trick the high impedence secondary of the EHT transformer would never in a million years be able to drive the ultra low impedence primary of the main air coil.

If you place a 12v 40W bulb in series with a 120v 40W bulb the latter will always be brighter (until it burns out) on any voltage due to its higher impedence. The tank circuit raises the impedence of your second bulb, that is all. If you could measure the RMS voltage over your output bulb accuratly (difficult job with the voltage spikes) and over the input bulb you'd find 2 things. Firstly that the 'output' bulb voltage is larger than the 'input' and secondly that they both add together to the same value (or slightly less due to losses) as the RMS voltage between the input terminals (which as I gather things is the output of your variac).

You have said before that most free energy devices you have looked at turned out to be mistakes in electronics measuring, but I look at it from a different perspective. I see the first error as ignoring the laws of thermodyamics.