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TV show - Lightning experiments

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shun...@googlemail.com

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Jan 27, 2009, 7:58:58 AM1/27/09
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Hello,

I am working for a television production comonay in the UK and we are
putting together a show which hopes to demonstrate many of the
properties of lightning and also highlight the areas which are not yet
fully explained. Our broadcaster would like to construct large-scale
impressive (nice whizz-bang stuff for the TV viewer to be amazed by)
experiments/demonstrations. Initial thoughts are things like massive
Faraday cages to show how aeroplanes are (relatively) safe in
lightning storms, using a building to conduct lightning and then
measuring the voltage by means of an LED graphic all the way up the
side of the building, etc etc.

Other ideas which could could be scaled-up from laboratory
experiments are greatfully accepted.

Many thanks in advance.

Benj

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Jan 27, 2009, 6:43:42 PM1/27/09
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On Jan 27, 7:58 am, shuntl...@googlemail.com wrote:

> Our broadcaster would like to construct large-scale
> impressive (nice whizz-bang stuff for the TV viewer to be amazed by)
> experiments/demonstrations.

Hey. Go see this guy!
http://www.tb3.com/tesla/biggg/

If that won't give you whizz-bang footage NOTHING will!

Also check out the "shrunken coins" of
http://capturedlightning.com/
[The high current of lightning strikes does things like that to metal]

Good luck.
PS. And please try to keep the science in your show valid and not a
bunch of showbiz bullshit!

Dirk Bruere at NeoPax

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Jan 28, 2009, 3:17:37 AM1/28/09
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Talk to this guy
http://www.eskimo.com/~billb/

--
Dirk

http://www.transcendence.me.uk/ - Transcendence UK
http://www.theconsensus.org/ - A UK political party
http://www.onetribe.me.uk/wordpress/?cat=5 - Our podcasts on weird stuff

J. B. Wood

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Jan 28, 2009, 6:00:56 PM1/28/09
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In article
<75b76b69-891b-4f6a...@p2g2000prn.googlegroups.com>, Benj
<bja...@iwaynet.net> wrote:

> On Jan 27, 7:58 am, shuntl...@googlemail.com wrote:
>
> > Our broadcaster would like to construct large-scale
> > impressive (nice whizz-bang stuff for the TV viewer to be amazed by)
> > experiments/demonstrations.
>
> Hey. Go see this guy!
> http://www.tb3.com/tesla/biggg/
>
> If that won't give you whizz-bang footage NOTHING will!
>

Hello, and for clarification to the OP if his program intends to deal with
atmospheric lightning he probably should avoid high-frequency AC
discharges such as those produced via Tesla coils, which I think would be
misleading to the viewers without further explanation. A Van de Graaf
generator(s) would be more appropos in a "ligthning program." Sincerely,

John Wood (Code 5550) e-mail: wo...@itd.nrl.navy.mil
Naval Research Laboratory
4555 Overlook Avenue, SW
Washington, DC 20375-5337

Benj

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Jan 29, 2009, 4:59:15 PM1/29/09
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On Jan 28, 6:00 pm, w...@itd.nrl.navy.mil (J. B. Wood) wrote:
> In article
> <75b76b69-891b-4f6a-92bc-d32e36627...@p2g2000prn.googlegroups.com>, Benj

>
> <bjac...@iwaynet.net> wrote:
> > On Jan 27, 7:58 am, shuntl...@googlemail.com wrote:
>
> > > Our broadcaster would like to construct large-scale
> > > impressive (nice whizz-bang stuff for the TV viewer to be amazed by)
> > > experiments/demonstrations.
>
> > Hey. Go see this guy!
> >http://www.tb3.com/tesla/biggg/
>
> > If that won't give you whizz-bang footage NOTHING will!
>
> Hello, and for clarification to the OP if his program intends to deal with
> atmospheric lightning he probably should avoid high-frequency AC
> discharges such as those produced via Tesla coils, which I think would be
> misleading to the viewers without further explanation. A Van de Graaf
> generator(s) would be more appropos in a "ligthning program." Sincerely,
>
> John Wood (Code 5550) e-mail: w...@itd.nrl.navy.mil

> Naval Research Laboratory
> 4555 Overlook Avenue, SW
> Washington, DC 20375-5337

Of course what John says is correct. However that means that to get
"Whizz-bang" footage you'd have to go to one of the laboratories with
actually "lightening simulator" gear. These used to exist in the USA
and I don't know if they still exist in the UK. Perhaps if the NRL has
one, they'll let you photograph it in action. In past large
manufacturers of electrical gear had them (GE, Westinghouse etc.) I
don't know about today.

Here's the deal. Lightning is produced by static charge that build up
in the sky that discharges to the ground (actually up from the ground
and back but that is another story). This discharge is of VERY high
current and of very high voltage. A true lightning simulator tries to
duplicate both. The Tesla coil (especially large ones) produce very
nice duplications of the voltages but are not static machines and
while having enough current to produce discharges that LOOK a lot like
lightning are high frequency currents (as John notes) and thus really
aren't lightning simulators. A Van de Graaff generator on the other
hand is a static DC machine much as is lightning, but only produces
minuscule currents. Thus they won't give you the impressive lightning-
like discharges that the high frequency machine will. They make your
hair stand up from the high voltage but really don't give the
impression of lightning and in fact because of the low current will
only discharge between large diameter electrodes. The way to go is a
real lightning simulator which is a huge stack of capacitors that are
charged up to a very high voltage and then discharged to test
equipment etc. This obviously isn't a static machine, although in the
end it is a DC machine but does produce come currents that come close
to real lightning strikes.

So there is an issue here of "valid science". I do mention the
"shrunken coin" thing because you can find pictures of copper items
from lightning strikes that have been bent and twisted by the high
current. (It's the magnetic induction that does it). And of course one
can accumulate decent footage of actual lightning phenomena. But the
unpredictable nature of lightning does not lend itself to laboratory
demonstrations. Hence there is a need for "simulations" of various
kinds. How good the final piece will be of course depends upon how
valid are the explanations of the science behind the demonstrations.
You can easily explain that you are only simulating a certain aspect
of lighting (truth) or you can simply show the huge zaps and let the
public draw their (erroneous) conclusions. The latter is what media
people like to call "a good story".

shun...@googlemail.com

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Feb 6, 2009, 12:22:06 PM2/6/09
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[ Mod. note: Snipped lots and lots of quoted text. -ik ]

[...]

Thank you all for your help and guidance. We hope we can do the neat
trick of being entertaining AND technically correct as possible. Not
everyone is a scientist so it's always a compromise on TV.

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