Previous
Story
Next
Story
Back to the Taylor Index
Back to the InfoAge Homepage
Dr. A. Hoyt Taylor:
|
 |
 |
Alexanderson alternator installed at New Brunswick
By the time I arrived, the first practical Alexanderson alternator was in operation at New Brunswick. The invention of the Alexanderson alternator, to my mind, was another milestone in radio progress. This has been well recognized by the fact that Dr. Alexanderson has received many honors for this and other notable contributions to the field of radio engineering. It was here that I first met "Alec” and started a warm friendship, based not only on our common interest in radio matters, but on the fact that we would both rather sail in any kind of craft than do anything else.Alexanderson had his famous multiple tuned antenna connected to this 50 K.W. alternator. This antenna, instead of having one vertical down lead, or connection to the transmitter, had six of them, and each lead was separately tuned, not only to a ground connection directly beneath it, but to its counterpoise. Thus all of the six down lead currents, after proper adjustments of counterpoise leads had been made, operated in phase, and the equivalent antenna output was actually six times as great as the feed current from the alternator. This current was of the order of 300 amperes. It was the war-time experiments with this alternator on daily traffic that encouraged the development of the much larger 500 K.W. alternator which has been the backbone of RCA long distance telegraphic communication for many years. The alternator itself is a marvelous piece of mechanical and electrical engineering. It was this alternator that handled the first communi-cation with Rome. So evidently, before I helped to tune up the Sayville Station, I knew how to tune a counterpoise.
An interesting thing about the New Brunswick Station was the fact that due to its fairly high power and the relatively low antennae, there existed a very-powerful electrical field under the antenna. Since this antenna installation was nearly a mile and a half long and the reservation not very well fenced, the Commanding Officer of New Brunswick had continuous patrols, especially during the night hours, under this antenna; to protect against possible sabotage. At first the sentries were armed with rifles with bayonets, but on a dark night you could see blue sparks coming out of the tip of the bayonet a good deal farther away than you could see the sentry. In the winter, when the sentries wore gloves, they suffered no great inconvenience, but in the summer when they were bare-handed, the induced currents burned their fingers in a very annoying fashion, and we were forced to substitute side arms for rifle and bayonet.
The gasoline filling station was almost under the antenna, so all automobiles had to be grounded when parked at the filling station. The nozzle of the gasoline hose had to be grounded as well. There would have been serious accidents, had these precautions not been taken.
The Navy planned to erect another station to supplement this high power
coastal system. This was to be an arc station. It eventually became the
Annapolis high power station, but was not in operation prior to the Armistice.
On the other side of the Atlantic, the Navy undertook the construction
of a gigantic station at Crois D’Hins, near Bordeaux, France. This was
equipped with a pair of 1200 K.W. arcs and, as I recollect, eight 800-foot
towers. When we laid these plans before the French, they threw up their
hands and said "my heavens, you expect to erect the equivalent of eight
Eiffel Towers". The work was done largely with the aid of German prisoners
of war, but was not completed until several years after the Armistice.
Commander Sweet, who was an officer of long experience in radio and an
expert on Poulsen Arcs, planned this work.
Page updated December 30, 2003
page created September 02, 2000
Previous
StoryNext
Story
Back to the Taylor Index
Back to the InfoAge Homepage