Nikola Tesla - A New System of Alternating Current Motors and Transformers and Other Essays

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Delivered before the American Institute of Electrical Engineers, May 1888.

I desire to express my thanks to Professor Anthony for the help he has given me in this matter. I would also like to express my thanks to Mr. Pope and Mr. Martin for their aid. The notice was rather short, and I have not been able to treat the subject so extensively as I could have desired, my health not being in the best condition at present. I ask your kind indulgence, and I shall be very much gratified if the little I have done meets your approval.

In the presence of the existing diversity of opinion regarding the relative merits of the alternate and continuous current systems, great importance is attached to the question whether alternate currents can be successfully utilized in the operation of motors. The transformers, with their numerous advantages, have afforded us a relatively perfect system of distribution, and although, as in all branches of the art, many improvements are desirable, comparatively little remains to be done in this direction. The transmission of power, on the contrary, has been almost entirely confined to the use of continuous currents, and notwithstanding that many efforts have been made to utilize alternate currents for this purpose, they have, up to the present, at least as far as known, failed to give the result desired. Of the various motors adapted to be used on alternate current circuits the following have been mentioned: 1. A series motor with subdivided field. 2. An alternate current generator having its field excited by continuous currents. 3. Elihu Thomsons motor. 4. A combined alternate and continuous current motor. Two more motors of this kind have suggested themselves to me.

1. A motor with one of its circuits in series with a transformer and the other in the secondary of the transformer. 2. A motor having its armature circuit connected to the generator and the field coils closed upon themselves. These, however, I mention only incidentally.

The subject which I now have the pleasure of bringing to your notice is a novel system of electric distribution and transmission of power by means of alternate currents, affording peculiar advantages, particularly in the way of motors, which I am confident will at once establish the superior adaptability of these currents to the transmission of power and will show that many results heretofore unattainable can be reached by their use; results which are very much desired in the practical operation of such systems and which cannot be accomplished by means of continuous currents.

Before going into a detailed description of this system, I think it necessary to make a few remarks with reference to certain conditions existing in continuous current generators and motors, which, although generally known, are frequently disregarded.

In our dynamo machines, it is well known, we generate alternate currents which we direct by means of a commutator, a complicated device and, it may be justly said, the source of most of the troubles experienced in the operation of the machines. Now, the currents so directed cannot be utilized in the motor, but they mustagain by means of a similar unreliable devicebe reconverted into their original state of alternate currents. The function of the commutator is entirely external, and in no way dues it affect the internal working of the machines. In reality, therefore, all machines are alternate current machines, the currents appearing as continuous only in the external circuit during their transit from generator to motor. In view simply of this fact, alternate currents would commend themselves as a more direct application of electrical energy, and the employment of continuous currents would only be justified if we had dynamos which would primarily generate, and motors which would be directly actuated by such currents.

But the operation of the commutator on a motor is twofold; firstly, it reverses the currents through the motor, and secondly, it effects, automatically, a progressive shifting of the poles of one of its magnetic constituents. Assuming, therefore, that both of the useless operations in the system, that is to say, the directing of the alternate currents on the generator and reversing the direct currents on the motor, be eliminated, it would still be necessary, in order to cause a rotation of the motor, to produce a progressive shifting of the poles of one of its elements, and the question presented itself,How to perform this operation by the direct action of alternate currents? I will now proceed to show how this result was accomplished.

In the first experiment a drum-armature was provided with two coils at right angles to each other, and the ends of these coils were connected to two pairs of insulated contact-rings as usual. A ring was then made of thin insulated plates of sheet-iron and wound with four coils, each two opposite coils being connected together so as to produce free poles on diametrically opposite sides of the ring. The remaining free ends of the coils were then connected to the contact-rings of the generator armature so as to form two independent circuits, as indicated in figure 9. It may now be seen what results were secured in this combination, and with this view I would refer to the diagrams, figures 1 to 8a. The field of the generator being independently excited, the rotation of the armature sets up currents in the coils C C1, varying in strength and direction in the well-known manner. In the position shown in figure 1 the current in coil C is nil while coil C1 is traversed by its maximum current, and the connections my be such that the ring is magnetized by the coils c1 c1 as indicated by the letters N S in figure 1a, the magnetizing effect of the coils c c being nil, since these coils are included in the circuit of coil C.

In figure 2 the armature coils are shown in a more advanced position, one-eighth of one revolution being completed. Figure 2a illustrates the corresponding magnetic condition of the ring. At this moment the coil c1 generates a current of the same direction as previously, but weaker, producing the poles n1 s1 upon the ring; the coil c also generates a current of the same direction, and the connections may be such that the coils c c produce the poles n s, as shown in figure 2a. The resulting polarity is indicated by the letters N S, and it will be observed that the poles of the ring have been shifted one-eighth of the periphery of the same.

In figure 3 the armature has completed one-quarter of one revolution. In this phase the current in coil C is maximum, and of such direction as to produce the poles N S in figure 3a, whereas the current in coil C1 is nil, this coil being at its neutral position. The poles N S in figure 3a are thus shifted one-quarter of the circumference of the ring.

Figure 4 shows the coils C C in a still more advanced position, the armature having completed three-eighths of one revolution. At that moment the coil C still generates a current of the same direction as before, but of less strength, producing the comparatively weaker poles n s in figure 4a, The current in the coil C1 is of the same strength, but of opposite direction. Its effect is, therefore, to produce upon the ring the poles n1 and sl as indicated, and a polarity, N S, results, the poles now being shifted three-eighths of the periphery of the ring.