Kelvin's Thunderstorm - Create lightning from water and gravity!.pdf

Kelvin's Thunderstorm - Create lightning from water and gravity!

http://www.instructables.com/id/Kelvin-s-Thunderstorm---Create-lightning-from-wate/?ALLSTEPS[10/19/2012 5:00:37 PM]

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Kelvin's Thunderstorm - Create lightning from waterand gravity!

Author: NK5105Followers

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Did you know that you could recreate thunderstorm lightning in your own home?

It's possible and is really easy to do. Granted, it's not nearly as exciting as a good old fashionthunderstorm, but the effect is still pretty cool and this lightning won't kill you!

The scientific name for this experiment is a water-drop electrostatic generator.

Watch the video for a quick overview, then check out the detailed instructions to see how to build yourown! (Scientific explanation is on step 6)

WARNING: This experiment can generate several thousand volts out of thin air,possible injuring or even killing a harmless little gnat or even a fly!

Video overview:

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Published: Aug 31, 2007

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HIGH VOLTAGE

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Step 1 Supplies

Show All 8 Images



Here's a list of supplies you will need for this experiment. You can get them all at your local hardwarestore.

- Garden Hose - Two buckets - 8 quart or larger are perfect - Packing Styrofoam - Hose 'Y' Adapter with flow-control valves - One foot of 3/4" plastic tubing - Two 3/4" end caps - Nylon thread or string - Wire - any kind of conducting wire works, even alligator leads. - Two bottomless soup or coffee cans - A drill with a small bit

Step 2 Prep the parts

There's a couple of things you'll need to do before putting it all together:

1. Drill holes in the end caps.This is the most important step. The end goal here is to create several continuous streams of waterdroplets.

In order to accomplish that, the holes must be properly spaced, otherwise they will join into a solidstream, defeating the purpose.

(This will still work with only one stream of droplets, but the energy buildup time is greatly reduced byhaving several!)

2. Drill holes in the cans.The cans will need three holes. Two on top for suspending it from something, and one on the bottom forthe metal wire.



Step 3 Prep the parts - continued

Now that you have all your holes drilled, it's time to finish the prep work.

1. Attach the wire to the can.Cut yourself plenty of wire to work with, and make sure it has good contact with the metal of the can.

2. Attach the thread to the can.Tie one end of the thread to the can. Cut a few feet to ensure there will be enough to suspend it.

Step 4 Put the pieces together



Now it's time to put it all together.

1. Connect the y-adapter to the hose.

2. Put the end caps in the plastic tubes.Be sure they are tight!

3. Attach the tubes to the y-adapters.I ended up having to use hose clamps to keep them them from slipping off.

Step 5 Put it all together



Now it's time to put the pieces together.

I used one of those folding ladders to attach the hose to, and to suspend the cans from.

1. Align the cans so they are directly under the tubes.

2. Connect the wire from each can to the opposite bucket.You can also use the wires to help secure the position of the cans under the plastic tubes.NOTE: Make sure the wires don't cross or come very close to each other!

3. Move the buckets close together.This is where the spark will jump. If you can't get them within about 1/2 inch of each other, you can alsojust attach a couple more pieces of wire to the handles of the bucket and use those for the spark gap.

Step 6 Explanation

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So what exactly are we doing with all of this?

Water, like many things, is composed of vast quantities of positive and negative electric charges inperfect balance. As water drips down from the top, the slightly positively-charged water is attracted tothe more negative can, and the slightly negative water is attracted to the more positive can.

This water-drop contraption utilizes Electrostatic Induction to generate a voltage difference between thetwo buckets. The charges then build up in the can connected to the bucket opposite of it - attractingeven more charge. This results in a positive feedback loop.

When the voltage difference is high enough (usually a few thousand volts), a spark will jump betweenthe buckets, discharging the voltage.

OK, but how does it start?

During dry conditions, everything near the generator ends up with a tiny electric charge just from beinghandled. It's the same concept that causes a shock after walking across carpet and touching agrounded object.

Once the water begins flowing, that natural charge is amplified over and over very quickly, resulting in alarge imbalance that corrects itself as a spark between the buckets.

For more information about electrostatic induction, refer to these great books from Amazon.com

Electrostatics by Niels Jonassen

Creative Experiments in Electricity

Electrostatic Discharge

Step 7 Turn it on!



Now it's time to turn the electrostatic generator on and begin producing some miniature lightning!

Turn your hose on, and then use the flow control valves on the y adapter to adjust the flow.

The water should come out fairly fast, but it needs to be as droplets and not a continuous stream. Acontinuous stream won't give the charges a chance to break away from the source, which is grounded.

Ideally, the droplets should begin to form just above the can, before it passes through it. I found that itwasn't very hard to get this working properly without much adjustment.

The water also shouldn't drip on the can, but pass through it instead. A little splashing is normal anddoesn't seem to affect the generation of electricity.

Once the water begins flowing, it should only take a few seconds for the first spark to appear. The moreindividual water droplet streams, the faster and more often you will get sparks!

Watch the video for close-ups of the sparks in action (Fast-forward to 34 secondsto go right to the sparks!):



Step 8 Troubleshooting

If you are not able to get things working as expected, here are some tips for troubleshooting yourdesign:

1. HumidityIf you live in a high humidity environment, don't even bother with this experiment - it won't work. Iproduced the results you see here with a relative humidity of around 60%.



Aug 23, 2012. 7:26 AM

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Apr 28, 2012. 8:35 PM

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Feb 12, 2012. 8:29 AM

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118 comments Add Comment

1-40 of 118 next

aaronXtreme says:

Ewade15 says:

cupcake9621 says:

dungeon runner says:

ahmaddaniels says:

fundash says:

Langarulz says:

hey this is cool, coulde I make this with a nini 9 volt?

I just tried this experiment and it didn't work. We ran it for about 3 minutes and didn't see aspark. the cans got a little wet but not very much. it also rained earlier in the day. Weused just a piece of metal wire as the conducting wire. Could someone please point outwhere I may have gone wrong? Do I need to get new conducting wire? Do the cans needto be COMPLETELY dry? Was the rain making it too humid? its only like 50 degrees here

How big is the spark suppose to be? How big did the spark get?

I think I should just make this clear to people worried about the dangers of high voltage:There is none. You could get hit with several million volts right now and not even notice it.It's the amperage of the current that counts.

Thank You soo much for stating this for those "Fear Mongers" out there, and thosepeople who just love to be scared of everything they don't fully understand.

yea, I saw a video on yotube, where it was only 2 volts, but high amps and it melted awire! XD

umm? wheres the video thingy?

2. Ground your water sourceYour garden hose should be grounded already. If you're having problems getting sparks, grab someextra wire and attach it to the screw of a wall outlet, or carefully attach it to the ground prong of anelectrical cord, and then plug it in.

3. Double check your wires from the cansAre they touching each other?Are they too close together?

4. Move the buckets closer together.It's best to move the buckets within a couple of millimeters to start off with, to be sure the generator isworking properly. Then you can move them farther and farther apart.



Feb 26, 2011. 1:51 PM

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Jan 7, 2010. 6:55 PM

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Sep 8, 2009. 3:33 PM

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Sep 8, 2009. 3:33 PM

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Dec 15, 2009. 9:21 PM

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Oct 10, 2009. 3:16 PM

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Sep 13, 2007. 7:45 PM

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Jul 15, 2009. 9:30 PM

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Sep 3, 2008. 10:33 AM

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sizcer says:

framistan says:

stefannasehi says:

stefannasehi says:

AlexWillisson says:

thierrywalt says:

phyck says:

shakna says:

mousewrites says:

Hi!excusme how do i connect the power source to the hose?and the adaptator of how many volts? tnks (:

i built this same thing in 7th grade. We found it DIFFICULT to make the spark becausethe water MUST not touch the metal cans as it falls... and the cans must sit on a DRYNON CONDUCTIVE surface... or else the electric charge would LEAK from one metal canto the other. It is NOT EASY to keep the area DRY when you are dripping watereverywhere! So this is just a note in case anyone tries to construct one. It does work butyou must not be messy with the water.

what would the flux cap do

?

Time travel

Do you have any idea on how I could connect this generator to this motor:http://www.instructables.com/id/E3ZNG7N7UFEP286FJA/ ?

Thanks!

ok i now almost nothing of this science , but hypothetically if you could curculate the samewater with a pump , (or gravity suction tube thing) , and some how harness the electricityisnt that potencially a pretty damn easy renewable energy resource ?

please enlighten me if this is possible with the correct enginereing , or if its just a quickidea that wont work -thx =)

Well it's a good idea... But it has one fatal floor before all the math of conservationworks... It's STATIC electricity. Not DC/AC, and you can't actually convert between staticand AC or DC. Static can be used to burn things, but as for powering them, it has a fewproblems.

Well, as those below have said, even in a 'nearly perfect' system, you will slowly loseenergy to the system itself. But if you're using kentic energy that has been stored bysomething else (like a waterfall), you could get some tiny bit of energy out of it using thissystem. It's all about letting something else put energy INTO the system you want to get



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Dec 22, 2007. 11:16 AM

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Aug 25, 2008. 5:09 AM

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Sep 11, 2009. 10:48 AM

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May 19, 2011. 10:47 AM

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Dec 18, 2008. 3:16 AM

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Dec 1, 2008. 12:59 PM

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Jul 1, 2009. 10:50 PM

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Zanpakutou says:

spikeychops says:

Noego says:

josephlebold says:

Pie Ninja says:

rivetgeek says:

Pie Ninja says:

it out of.

It won't work. No matter how hard you tried, you would always be putting more energyinto the pump than you would be getting back. And you can't circulate water by gravityalone.

Yep, can't get more out than in, conservation of energy, just like an 'A' bomb...hangon,..no that's not right is it..slightly more energy out than the TNT or tiny A bomb usedto set the main A bomb off.. Ok, then...the atom itself. The atom demonstrates the lawsof conservation perfectly, doesn't it? The electron(s) spin(s) around the nucleus until itruns out of ener...oh dear..no, that's another bad example really isn't it. OK, got it thistime...the solar system! That, needs to be constanly fed new energy in order tomaintain orbits, planes etc..hang on a moment! That doesn't work either, does it.Hmmm..this conservation of energy 'law' is a bit of a flakey law really isn't it. The onlypoeple this so called 'law' has served, is the people that try to convince the rest of usthat this law exists and is valid 100% of the time. The truth of it, is that it's only validMOST of the time. A bit like saying 99 out of 100 UFO sightings are not reallyspace/dimentional craft, but other normal objects, therefore, UFO's don't exist. Fine untilyou realise that because most are not 'real', if just 1 of 100 IS 'real', then the other 99count for zilch.

Please, spikeychops, there is no evil conspiracy in the CoE law. The law works onmechanical principles, not nuclear ones (until you get down to the sub-at level, whereit really still does). You really have to look into laws like this with a (decently)educated background. Once you know all the facts of it you will find that it does work,100% of the time. Not saying no conspiracies exist period- just that if you look forthem everywhere you will make them up with a combination of incomplete and flawedknowledge and vindictive imagination.

what happens when the electrons in matter run out of energy and they stop spinningaround the protons? do they finally meet up with the protons and cease to exist?since no energy is left in the atom does it just vanish silently?

Ugggh, Energy cannot be created or destroyed, it can only be changed into aotherform...wait, why am I writing all this out?

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law_of_conservation_of_energy

Why is it that the people who know the least, know it the loudest?

*sigh* God I hope you haven't passed 5th grade science yet. splitting the atom simplyreleases energy storing in the form of nuclear binding forces. It doesn't create energy.Energy can not be created. Ever. It can only be converted from one form to another.

I apologize if i was unclear, I was merely explaining to him the law of conservationof energy, I am perfectly aware that E = mc2 and that by splitting an atom you releaseenergy equal to its mass multiplied by the speed of light squared, i.e an astronomically large

amount.



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Jul 1, 2009. 11:15 PM

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Pie Ninja says:

Zanpakutou says:

spikeychops says:

rivetgeek says:

davecollinsnz says:

Langarulz says:

chriskarr says:

And can anyone tell me how to get my text back to normal after I make itsuperscript?

The law does exist and is valid 100% of the time. Regarding the A-Bomb, you've gotto remember that matter and energy are equivalent; energy was put in, in the form ofmatter, which was converted to energy during the explosion. As for the orbits ofplanets and electrons, they aren't losing any energy as they orbit, because there is nofriction from air etc., so no more energy needs to be added in order for them tomaintain their orbits. Correct me if I'm wrong, but the law still holds in each example.

Hi Again, I think you have it wrong when you say there is no friction on the planets.Cosmic dust and debris smash into the planets and have done to a greater or lesserextent for billions of years. Thousands and thousands of tonnes of dust, rock, metalfalls through our atmosphere every year, the same is true of all other planets. Thefriction is evidenced everytime we see meteor trails burning in the sky. Also, spaceis not 'empty'. It has billions of tonnes of charged particles whizzing around, it hasloosely spaced atoms of virtually ALL elements, perhaps a few atoms every cubedfoot or so, but x that by infinity (for space) and x that by 4.5 billion years (approxage of our planet), and that makes for a lot of resistance. What about electrons?Well, they have to contend with forces too. Electromagnetic attractions andrepulsions, chemical interactions, quantum particle interaction, all have an effect, butan electron (as far as we can tell at our present tech) will orbit it's nucleus at aconstant speed and distance until the end of time. But where does the 'energy' ordriving force come from that causes this to be so? If the electron (or scale upexactly the same model for a solar system, a spiral galaxy, perhaps even this wholeuniverse itself), isn't an example of (I'll NOT say perpetual motion, even though it is)'obtaining energy through non apparent means', then I can't think of a more obviousor apt example to prove the existence of this phenomena. All we ridiculous humanshave to do, is discover and replicate the effect, and we'll all be moving to the stars,to start our own private family planets!

electromagnetism. It's a basic force. Next.

Err, actually the planets are losing energy, because the sun's gravity is tugging onthe planets, making them orbit instead of flying off in a straight line. So eventually(ignoring the future expansion of the sun) the planets would crash into the sun.

but the planets have momentum so we would never crash into the sun (ignoringthe expansion of the sun)

Matter and energy are not equivalent. Matter can not be turned into energy, just asenergy can not be turned into matter, but, instead, the energy that's already in theatom can be forced out. If you think about the fact that the atom's nucleus willexplode at nearly the speed of light (thanks to the SNF - that's the strong nuclearforce) because of the energy already contained within the atomic structure. There isno such thing as a conversion from matter to energy.



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Oct 28, 2008. 11:50 PM

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Sep 27, 2009. 6:29 AM

PyromaniacDaniel says:

davecollinsnz says:

chriskarr says:

BlackFang171 says:

chriskarr says:

Dirtie Hippie says:

"matter and energy are not equivalent" actually we now know that what weperceive as matter is really just the interaction of different energys and everythingis energy and theoretically could be converted from one form to another.everything is made up of atoms. atoms are made up of protons, neutrons, andelectrons. these are made up of quantum particles which just recently have beenfound to be forms of energy themselves. Correct me if I am wrong. which this isoff the top of my head not from a source. but its late and I don't feel like looking itup.

Ever heard of this small equation?E=MCEnergy equals mass times the speed of light squaredThats the basic theory (I think) behind a nuclear bomb, matter is converted toenergy.:D

Matter is NOT converted to energy. The strong nuclear force is being over-powered by the initial blast in the bomb. This causes rapid atomic decay, inwhich the protons of the atom are shot out at speeds near to, at, or exceedingthe speed of light. Matter is not converted to energy, but, instead matter gives offenergy. An easy way to describe this is in a similar manner to an exothermic orendothermic reaction; in an exothermic or endothermic reaction, the reactivematerial gives off energy or pulls in energy, respectively. In an exothermicreaction, bonds are generally broken; because it takes energy to make thosebonds, the reaction puts off energy. In an endothermic reaction, the opposite istrue. The same basic principle applies in a nuclear reaction, only on a MUCHlarger scale (with smaller parts!). Isn't science wonderful?

Matter IS being converted into energy, as is evident in the difference of massthat is exhibited between the mass of a particle you split, and the sum of themasses of the resulting particles. This is elementary physics.

Sorry; I am going to need to take back my prior comment, to a degree.Matter is, in fact, not being *converted* to energy...matter is naught morethan condensed energy receiving mass from its interaction with a sort of'grid', according to the standard model of particle physics and the theory ofHiggs interaction.

This is quantum physics.

I had not thought of it before, but you are right. Matter is not converted intoenergy. Even in an atomic blast. The protons, neutrons, and electrons are stillthere just as they were before. Good old E=mc2 only refers to the release ofthe energy bonds. The electromagnetic bond of the electron/proton is brokenand the electron goes flying off and photons carrying that energy go flying off.The nuclear bonds of the proton/neutron are broken and they go flying off andphotons carrying that energy. The matter (i.e. proton, neutrons, and electrons)are all still present, just not bonded together.

And as for some particles exceeding the speed of light. Why even get intothat? Yes, some tiny, tiny, tiny amount of them do. But that's this crazyquantum mechanical, they can do it cause we can't observe them thing. It justconfuses people. By people I mean laymen, students, advanced physicists with



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Sep 9, 2008. 8:37 PM

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davecollinsnz says:

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three doctorates. :)

"in which the protons of the atom are shot out at speeds near to, at, orexceeding the speed of light." Something tells me that the above statment isflawed. Matter, travelling near the speed of light? Yes. (LHC particle beam99.999%) At the speed of light? Nearly impossible. (Massive amount ofenergy) Exceeding the speed of light? No. Photons travel so very fast becausethey have little to zero mass. When I talk of matter to energy, I'm meaningmatter to photons (aka electromagnetic radiation). I know that a neutron can besplit into a proton and an electron, which then bombard other sub-atomicparticles, thus setting up a nuclear chain reaction, in the right materials. Forthe exothermic and endothermic reactions, you sorta had a comparision, sinceas the molecules interact and electrons moved about, they emitt or requireinfra-red radiation to react. :D

Actually to travel at the speed of light you'd need infinite energy. sry for beina pedant.

Also you can travel faster than light, you just need to go back in time, andto do that, all you have to do is go faster than the speed of light. :P

According to quantum physics you can't go faster than light...



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