current returning to a different source

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crossman said:
And have you noticed since the engineers in this thread have basically described what is happening in the past few days, that rick has been MIA?
No. Rick is MIA simply because he decided that it is not worth the hassle or abuse (not speaking towards you, Crossman) to engage in this any further. This forum has lived up to its reputation. I stated my position, and I still stand by it. I have no interest in rehashing the same statements over and over.

The discussion hasn't changed, and no new information has been added. When you state that the "Engineers have described what is happening", you are simply affirming that you agree with yourself. That's not the same as a critical review.

The arguments that have been presented are cyclical, in that you are using the original premise as proof of the premise. Nothing has been proven. To that end, you still have not completed a full analysis of your own premises. If you really want to prove your hypothesis, then maybe the best approach is to first disprove mine.
 
Rick,

Could you please explain the following:

Rick Christopherson said:
While not really feasible, just for example, if you connected a wire between the Earth and the Moon, you would have a monstrous current flowing in that wire, even though there was no return circuit. The reason is because of the innate voltage difference between these two bodies.

We do see this every day in real life, but normally the charge between the two bodies is low enough that they equalize too rapidly to account for the difference. If the voltage difference was sustainable, then the current would remain indefinitely, regardless of a return path.

I entirely agree with the point that if you run a conductor between two bodies that are at different voltage, then current will flow through that conductor, even if there is no closed path. Furthermore, I agree that this current will flow for as long as the voltage difference is sustained, again if there is no closed path.

But if one were to somehow run a conductor from Earth to Moon, just how much current would flow, and for how long would it be sustained? My understanding is that the Earth-Moon system would simply be a charged capacitor, and that the conductor would discharge it. But you seem to be saying implying that the Earth-Moon voltage difference is somehow permanent and that the current flow would be sustained indefinitely.

Please feel free to use hand-waving values; if the Earth-Moon system is a capacitor, give me a ballpark capacitance; if you belive that the current would flow forever, then just say that; though if the latter, please explain what maintains the voltage difference.

Thanks
Jon
 
crossman said:
But that capacity is in relation to the universe as a whole?

I don't know guys. I thought I was on target earlier, but now I am wondering what each of us is thinking.

Are we simply arguing semantics?

I am going on record that the electrostatic field which exists between the positive terminal and the negative terminal* of a voltage source will be the very driving force that will push/pull electrons onto or away from remote bodies, thereby giving them an electrical charge.

*or any extension thereof such as a wire connected to it
The text I highlighted is exactly the point of my circuit diagram. The only difference is that closing one switch adds substantial amount of conductive mass to the open circuit.

If you connect a wire, in and of itself being electrostatically neutral prior to connection, to a terminal of voltage source, you thereby extend the electrostatic field. Without a current flow, how do you propose this extending of the field takes place?
 
winnie said:
Rick,I entirely agree with the point that if you run a conductor between two bodies that are at different voltage, then current will flow through that conductor, even if there is no closed path. Furthermore, I agree that this current will flow for as long as the voltage difference is sustained, again if there is no closed path.
That is the only point I have been making from the very outset. If you have a difference in voltage, you will have a current flow (given a conductive path). It makes no difference if there is a return or not. In most cases, the voltage difference cannot be sustained, and that is the reason why I came up with two examples where the voltage could be sustained.
winnie said:
But if one were to somehow run a conductor from Earth to Moon, just how much current would flow, and for how long would it be sustained?
The current would follow Ohm's Law such that the voltage difference divided by the resistance of the wire would determine the current. How long this would last is dependent on how much charge difference exists, and how quickly the charge is replenished via the original mechanism that put the charge there in the first place. Capacitance is not the mechanism that put the charge on these bodies in the first place.
winnie said:
My understanding is that the Earth-Moon system would simply be a charged capacitor, and that the conductor would discharge it. But you seem to be saying implying that the Earth-Moon voltage difference is somehow permanent and that the current flow would be sustained indefinitely.
If the charge was put there by capacitive effects, what put the charge there in the first place? If the conductor is the means for discharging the capacitor, then how did it get charged in the first place. Where is the voltage reference that permitted this charge to be developed to begin with?

Where is the "zero potential" referenced from? Where is the return path when we are dealing with millions of miles? What about the voltage difference that existed before we added the conductor between the bodies?

Until we add that wire, we have two bodies at some unknown voltage between them, so how does this define a capacitor? What charged one body relative to the other? Where is the circuit path?

winnie said:
if you belive that the current would flow forever, then just say that; though if the latter, please explain what maintains the voltage difference.
No. The current would (or may) not exist forever. If and when the two bodies reach equilibrium, then no current would flow. However, the mechanism that created the charge difference in the first place is likely larger than what we could bleed off with a simple conductor. In a sense, two massive bodies such as this will result in a near-infinite charge differential, and the voltage will remain so long as we do not have a conductor large enough to equalize the charge. I don't know the answer, but I would speculate that this conductor would have to be extremely massive to pass the necessary charge.

The same rationale is necessary for the helicopter. If the charge transmission was rapid enough, then we would not see a voltage difference between the line and the helicopter. There would be no arcing.

All of the previous discussions have made the assumption that a capacitance exists, and this much is true. However, they all assume that this capacitance is the primary mechanism, without ever going through the mathematics of what this capacitance would be. An electric motor has a capacitance in its windings, but this capacitance is not what makes the rotor turn. Just because you can prove that it is there does not mean you have proven that it is the primary mechanism.
 
Presuming the Moon is conductive, we could raise flagpoles on Earth and Moon. We now have a capacitor of sorts and the flagpoles are the leads. Now connect the leads, and we simply have a shorted capacitor. The wire itself is the return path! Even if the dielectric becomes leaky, the electrical model is that of a resistor connected between the leads.

That is, we can consider the cap to be a source, then the shorting wire is the return path. The amount of charge is immaterial unless it is infinite, then that is another issue.

But so what? It is still not a sustainable current and has no bearing on the helicopter issue or on the original question..
 
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For my sanity, could I please get some simple "yes" or "no" answers to the following questions?

Concerning Smart's diagram...

reservoir.jpg


1) With switches open, are Points A and B positive?

2) Are Points F and G negative?

3) If Switch 1 is closed, do electrons flow from the conductive body D towards the positive terminal of the battery at A?

2) If electrons flow off of the conductive body D, does the conductive body become more positive?

3) If the conductive body D becomes more positive, does the wire from the conductive body D to point E become more positive?

4) Does point E become more positive?

5) Do opposite charges attract?

6) If Point E becomes more positive, does this attract electrons to point F?

As mentioned, I would really appreciate some simple yes or no answers from anyone kind enough to do so.
 
crossman said:
For my sanity, could I please get some simple "yes" or "no" answers to the following questions?
The answer to all of these questions is yes.

This means that when you close the switch, there is a small amount of current flowing momentarily in the whole system.
 
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crossman said:
For my sanity, could I please get some simple "yes" or "no" answers to the following questions?
Several people, including myself, have already answered these questions, but those answers have gone unnoticed. Go back through this thread and you will find your answers.

This is the point I was making earlier. You have drawn your conclusions and are looking for any glimmer of an answer to support it, to the exclusion of any other answer. Broaden your thoughts.
 
Crossman, "Positive and negative" are relative. You must specify a reference point when asking this question.

Furthermore, you must draw in the stray capacitances and specify initial conditions in order to predict the transient currents.

There is no such thing as totally free charge. Each electron must be connected to a positive charge through an electrostatic field.
 
Rick, I belive I am getting a glimmer of where we are misunderstanding each other.

1) You have been berating several of us for clinging to the concept of 'capacitor' where there isn't a capacitor. In this I strongly disagree with your assessment. Things that some of us have called capacitors you have called 'electron reservoirs'. I belive that you've been creating a false distinction; these things are capacitors in their rawest form. A sphere in free space, with the counter electrode at infinity still has a defined capacitance. Move a unit charge to this sphere, and the electric field around the sphere will change. Move another charge, and the field will change again. Energy is stored in this electric field, and the changing electric field produces a magnetic field.

2) It is clear that both sides of this discussion are playing games with semantic confusion. We've not agreed on a definition of a 'closed path' or 'closing the path'. The simplest AC capacitor circuit, an _ideal_ alternating voltage source connected to an _ideal_ capacitor, is an _open_ path. There is no complete electrical conducting path. Yet current clearly and measurably flows. It is equally correct to say that the current is flowing in an open path, or to say that the path is closed by ' capacitive current', but we need to agree on which definition that we are using.

I prefer to say that the path is closed by ' capacitive current', because there is a _changing_ electric field, caused by the movement of charge from one electrode to another, and this _changing_ electric field has the same magnetic effect as the current flowing in the wires leading up to the capacitor. In other words, if I were to somehow wrap a clamp on current probe around the electric field passing from one electrode to the other in this circuit, the current measured would be the same as the current measured when the current probe was around the wire.

But this is a language distinction, and I will work with your language if you define it.

3) Regarding the helicopter and the line, if I understand you correctly, you are saying that as the voltage of the line changes, current needs to flow to (from) the helicopter in order to maintain it at the same voltage as the line, because it is a charge reservoir. As I've stated above, to me this is clearly a description of an object with capacitance, just like a capacitor.

4) Regarding the Earth-Moon system, you correctly point out that we don't know the charging mechanism, or if there is a charging mechanism. Solar wind could be pulling ions from Earth and depositing them on the Moon, or LGMs could be firing electron beams from the moon to make pretty pictures in the ionosphere. If there exists a mechanism by which charges are moving through free space from Earth to Moon or the reverse, then a continuous current could flow on a wire between the two. However this would be a closed path in the classical 'charges moving around in a complete path' sense. I challenge you to posit a mechanism that would maintain the charge between the Earth and the Moon, if we were to run a 'drain wire' between the two, which would not involve actual charged particles moving around outside of this drain wire.

5) Regarding capacitance and the arcing line. I absolutely agree that the over-all capacitance to Earth, over the entire length of the line, is far greater than the capacitance of the helicopter to Earth. I calculated the capacitance of the helicopter at about 300pf. This is enough that if the helicopter were bonded to the line, about 60mA of capacitive current would flow via the helicopter into the electric field around the helicopter. This _capacitive current flow_ involves no arcing between the helicopter and Earth, because this capacitive current flow is in the form of the changing electric field between the helicopter and the rest of the universe, primarily the Earth.

When the helicopter is near the line, you have a 2 capacitor system; you have the capacitor formed between the line and the helicopter, and the helicopter and the rest of the Earth. This two capacitor system forms a voltage divider. When the capacitor gets close enough, the voltage across this capacitor exceeds its breakdown voltage, and it arcs over. Once it arcs, then the arc is carrying the current which is continuously charging and discharging the second capacitor.

-Jon
 
I've just reviewed 17 pages of this thread and I want my life back.

Heres the skinny - it is all explained by capacitance. If you use the word "charge" then the chances are you are talking about a system that has capacitance. AC operates very differently to DC, so steady state diagrams aren't helpful when you get deeper than the level of light switches. As the frequency goes up, the level of black magic and art required to design systems increases. At a few megahertz pieces of wire (and PCB tracks) have significant inductive properties. Which isn't strictly relevant, other than to note that you can have a riddle in the form "when is a piece of wire not a piece of wire?" to which the answer is "when AC is flowing through it".

Edited to add - when you switch on an alleged DC circuit, there is a period of time during which the current is changing from zero current flow to the steady state current flow, and during that time the system acts as an AC circuit, as there is a rate of change of current flow, ergo a current waveform. Given that the rate of change will (if we are really talking about just a switch) be quite fast then the AC properties will be short lived, but the harmonics will go up to many MHz. Which is why switch clicks can be heard on (AM) radios...

That nice arc between the chopper and the line - someone's figured it out that maybe 60mA flows, and as it's an equalizing charge transfer, it's going to be a 120 times a second arc. Well, for every 100KV, 60mA is 6KW. It's a good job the spark only lasts less than a millisecond or the equalizing probe would melt...

In the diagram above, as stated by several folks already, you can't have -ve and +ve without a reference. Proof - get digital multimeter, set to 10VDC scale, plug in just the +ve probe, and touch 9 volt battery with just red probe. No voltage noted. Now switch the meter to AC and hold just red probe betwixt your fingers. Ooooo - look - volts - where did they come from? Answer - capacitive coupling both to you holding the probe, and to the meter internal circuitry to somewhere at a different potential difference with respect to the planet... And current is flowing through the test meter lead. If your meter is sensitive enough to measure AC micro-amps, switch it to that and see the uA flow.

Here's a fallacy: overhead high voltage electricity lines don't leak power - oh yes they do, loads of it. The trick on high voltage AC transmission is to pick the voltage correctly, as you are balancing I^2R losses from the current flow against the capacitance losses that increase as you increase the voltage. To transmit a lot of power over a long distance you use DC, as there is no capacitance losses. Its more or less impossible to use underground or underwater high voltage AC cables over any length, as the capacitance losses are so high.

Must go take some more pills...
 
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jghrist said:
The answer to all of these questions is yes.

This means that when you close the switch, there is a small amount of current flowing momentarily in the whole system.

I thank my lucky heavens that Jghrist is a member of this forum. Thank you for understanding my point.
 
winnie said:
You have been berating several of us for ...
Where have you and Rattus been getting this notion that I have berated anyone? I am perfectly capable of berating people, and that I do not deny, however, I have not done so in this thread nor on this forum as a whole since I signed up a short time ago.

If I was berating someone, they would most certainly know it, and I would most certainly get admonished for it.

I left this discussion previously because Rattus accused me of similar tactics that I was not guilty of, and now out of the blue, you do the same.

Attack my statements; not me. .

Given the caliber of the participants on this forum, I have the utmost respect for this forum, and I have been extremely careful with my responses; so I resent the fact that the two of you have accused me of berating anyone when this has not occurred.

This forum's reputation precedes itself, and you have attributed my postings to this forum's reputation, when I have not yet fallen into this reputation. I am not above this reputation myself, but don't accuse me of it until I have actually been guilty of it.:mad:
 
Darn it, Rattus.... okay, new questions for you....

reservoir.jpg


1) If Switch 1 is closed, do electrons flow from the conductive body D towards the terminal of the battery at A?

2) If electrons flow off of the conductive body D, does the conductive body now contain more holes then it previously did before the switch closed?

3) If the conductive body D becomes has more holes, does the wire from the conductive body D to point E also contain more holes than it did before switch 1 closed??

4) Does point E have more holes then it did before switch 1 closed?

5) Do holes attract electrons?

6) If Point E has excess holes, does this attract electrons to point F?

As mentioned, I would really appreciate some simple yes or no answers from anyone kind enough to do so.[/quote]
 
rattus said:
There is no such thing as totally free charge. Each electron must be connected to a positive charge through an electrostatic field.

Also, Rattus, this is exactly what i have been trying to say to those who think differently than this. The entire thing from negative side of source to positive side of the source is tied together through current flow and electrostatic fields and each side of the circuit cannot operate independently.
 
winnie said:
Entire post #170

I have read my texts, I have read this thread to the nth degree, I have thought about this on the drive to and from work, I have thought about it as I lay in bed at night, and during the day.

I have maintained an open mind but have not seen any evidence to convince me of an alternate explanation of the phenomena.

I have not "clung" to capacitance as a holy grail to defend my naive thoughts. No, what i have done is come to the only logical conclusion.

I vote for Winnie for god!


Thank you winnie for the concise summation of the entire thread.
 
Rick Christopherson said:
Where have you and Rattus been getting this notion that I have berated anyone?

I apologize for saying that you have berated people, however I request that you re-read some of the things that you have written in this thread. I would suggest that the following is an arguably insulting statement that we are thinking incorrectly about this topic. This and other posts of the same tone are where I get the notion that you are berating people, and if I am misreading that tone, then I am sorry. Post #115 of this thread where you say:

Rick Christopherson said:
I thought we were making progress on this, but all of a sudden, it fell into the crapper and the two of you are reverting back to the terms you are more comfortable with. Crossman was headed down the right path with his research, but the instant the ?cap-word? was brought back into the discussion, he abandoned everything he was learning, threw up his arms in surrender, and reverted back to his baser thoughts.

Any interest in addressing the rest of my post?

-Jon
 
winnie said:
I apologize for saying that you have berated people, however...
Let's see....you have nearly 1000 postings and have been hanging around here for almost two years....and all this time, I thought I was the "newbie"? :grin:

So in your thousand postings on this pleasant little forum, this is what you consider "berating"? :mad: :D :D

I may not have registered until recently, but I have had this forum bookmarked for a long time. I must have just mistaken this forum for the crocheting forum down the street, where they can really have some knock-down-drag-out discussions about which yarn is the best to use.:D :D :D :D

Yes, this is tongue-in-cheek!!!

By the way, so was the previous posting you quoted. If I was berating someone, there would be no doubts about it.
 
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Well, Rick, I didn't particularly take offense to that quoted statement made concerning my thoughts..

However, what I did take from it was this:

"Rick seems to have some kind of sEcReT kNowLeDgE of the phenomenon at hand because he has told me I am wrong several times. Yet he has not offerred any of this sEcReT kNowLeDgE to help me find my way. Is it possible that Rick doesn't have a clue about what is going on?"

Can you understand why I would think that?
 
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