ON THE MECHANICAL PRODUCTION OF ELECTRIC CURRENTS.

The object of these articles is to lay down in the simplest and most intelligible way the principles which are concerned in the mechanical production of electric currents. Every one knows now that electric lights are produced from powerful currents of electricity generated in a machine containing magnets and coils of wire, and driven by a steam engine, or gas engine, or water-wheel. But of the thousands who have heard that a steam engine can thus provide us with electric currents, how many are there who comprehend the action of the generator or dynamo-electric machine? How many, of engineers even, can explain where the electricity comes from, or how the mechanical power is converted into electrical energy, or what the magnetism of the iron magnets has to do with it all? Take any one of the dynamo-electric machines of the present date--the Siemens, the Gramme, the Brush, or the Edison machine--of each of these there exist descriptions excellent in their way, and sufficient for men already versed in the technicalities of electric science. But to those who have not served an apprenticeship to the technicalities--to all but professed electricians--the action of these machines is almost an unknown mystery. As, however, an understanding of the how and the why of the dynamo-electric machine or generator is the very A B C of electrical engineering, an exposition of the fundamental principles of the mechanical production of electric currents demands an important place in the current science of the day. It will be our endeavor to expound these principles in the plainest terms, while at the same time sacrificing nothing in point of scientific accuracy or of essential detail.

The modern dynamo-electric machine or generator may be regarded as a combination of iron bars and copper wires, certain parts of the machinery being fixed, while other parts are driven round by the application of mechanical forces. How the movement of copper wires and iron bars in this peculiar arrangement can generate electric currents is the point which we are proposing to make clear. Friction has nothing to do with the matter. The old-fashioned spark-producing "electrical machine" of our youthful days, in which a glass cylinder or disk was rotated by a handle while a rubber of silk pressed against it, has nothing in common with the dynamo-electric generator, except that in both something turns upon an axis as a grindstone or the barrel of a barrel-organ may do. In the modern "dynamo" we cannot help having friction at the bearings and contact pieces, it is true, but there should be no other friction. The moving coils of wire or "armatures" should rotate freely without touching the iron pole-pieces of the fixed portion of the machine. In fact friction would be fatal to the action of the "dynamo." How then does it act? We will proceed to explain without further delay. There are, however, three fundamental principles to be borne in mind if we would follow the explanation clearly from step to step, and these three principles must be laid down at the very outset.

1. The first principle is that the existence of the energy of electric currents, and also the energy of magnetic attractions, must be sought for not so much in the wire that carries the current, or in the bar of steel or iron that we call a magnet, as in the space that surrounds the wire or the bar.

2. The second fundamental principle is that the electric current is, in one sense, quite as much a magnetic fact as an electrical fact; and that the wire which carries a current through it has magnetic properties (so long as the current flows) and can attract bits of iron to itself as a steel magnet does.

3. The third principle to be borne in mind is that to do work of any kind, whether mechanical or electrical, requires the expenditure of energy to a certain amount. The steam engine cannot work without its coal, nor the laborer without his food; nor will a flame go on burning without its fuel of some kind or other. Neither can an electric current go on flowing, nor an electric light keep on shedding forth its beams, without a constant supply of energy from some source or other.

Fig. 1.

The last of these three principles, involving the relation of electric currents to the work they can do and to the energy expended in their production, will be treated of separately and later. Meantime we resume the task of showing how such currents can be produced mechanically, and how magnetism comes in in the process.

Fig. 2

Surrounding every magnet there is a "field" or region in which the magnetic forces act. Any small magnet, such for example as a compass needle, when brought into this field of force, exhibits a tendency to set itself in a certain direction. It turns so as to point with its north pole toward the south pole of the magnet, and with its south pole toward the north pole of the magnet; or if it cannot do both these things at once, it takes up an intermediate position under the joint action of the separate forces and sets in along a certain line. Such lines of force run through the magnetic "field" from one pole of the magnet to the other in curves. If we define a line of force as being the line along which a free north-seeking magnetic pole would be urged, then these lines will run from the north pole of the magnet round to the south pole, and pass through the substance of the magnet itself. In Fig. 1 a rough sketch is given of the lines of magnetic force as they emerge from the poles of a bar magnet in tufts. The arrow heads show the direction in which a free north pole would move. These lines of forces are no fiction of the imagination, like the lines of latitude and longitude on the globe; they exist and can be rendered visible by the simplest of expedients. When iron filings are sprinkled upon a card or a sheet of glass below which a magnet is placed, the filings set themselves--especially if aided by a gentle tap--along the lines of force. Fig. 2 is a reproduction from nature of this very experiment, and surpasses any attempt to draw the lines of force artificially. It is impossible to magnetize a magnet without also in this fashion magnetizing the space surrounding the magnet; and the space thus filled with the lines of force possesses properties which ordinary unmagnetic space does not possess. These lines give us definite information about the magnetic condition of the space where they are. Their direction shows us the direction of the magnetic forces, and their density shows us the strength of the magnetic forces; for where the force is strongest there we have the lines of force most numerous and most strongly delineated in the scattered filings. To complete this first consideration of the magnetic field surrounding a magnet, we will take a look at Fig. 3, which reproduces the lines of filings as they settle in the field of force opposite the end of a bar magnet. The repulsion of the north pole of the magnet upon the north poles of other magnets would be, of course, in lines diverging radially from the magnet pole.

Fig. 3

We will next consider the space surrounding a wire through which a current of electricity is flowing. This wire has magnetic properties so long as the current continues, and will, like a magnet, act on a compass needle. But the needle never tries to point toward the wire; its tendency is always to set itself broadside to the current and at right angles to it. The "field" of a current flowing up a straight wire is, in fact, not unlike the sketch shown in Fig. 4, where instead of tufted groups we have a sort of magnetic whirl to represent the lines of force. The lines of force of the galvanic field are, indeed, circles or curves which inclose the conducting wire, and their number is proportional to the strength of the current. In the figure, where the current is supposed to be flowing up the wire (shown by the dark arrows), the little arrows show the direction in which a free north pole would be urged round the wire;[1] a south pole would, of course, be urged round the wire in the contrary direction. Now, though when we look at the telegraph wires, or at any wire carrying a current of electricity, we cannot see these whirls of magnetic force in the surrounding space, there is no doubt that they exist there, and that a great part of the energy spent in starting an electric current is spent in producing these magnetic whirls in the surrounding space. There is, however, one way of showing the existence of these lines of force; similar, indeed, to that adopted for showing the lines of force in the field surrounding a magnet. Pass the conducting wire up through a hole in a card or a plate of glass, as shown in Fig. 5, and sprinkle filings over the surface. They will, when the glass is gently tapped, arrange themselves in concentric circles, the smallest and innermost being the best defined because the magnetic force is strongest there. Fig 6 is an actual reproduction of the circular lines produced in this fashion by iron filings in the field of force surrounding an electric current.

[Footnote 1: It will not be out of place here to recall Ampere's ingenious rule for remembering the direction in which a current urges the pole of a magnetic needle. "Suppose a man swimming in the wire with the current, and that he turns so as to face the needle, then the north pole of the needle will be deflected toward his left hand.">[

Fig. 4

This experimental evidence must suffice to establish two of the three fundamental points stated at the outset, for they prove conclusively that the electric current may be treated as a magnetic phenomenon, and that both in the case of the pole of a magnet, and in that of the wire which carries a current, a portion, at any rate, of the energy of the magnetic forces exists outside the magnet or the current, and must be sought in the surrounding space.

Fig. 5

Fig. 6

Having grasped these two points, the next step in our argument is to establish the relation between the current and the magnet, and to show how one may produce the other.

Fig. 7

If we wind a piece of copper wire into a helix or spiral, as in Fig. 7, and pass a current of electricity through it, the magnetic whirls in the surrounding space are modified, and the lines of force are no longer small circles wrapping round the conducting wire. For now the lines of force of adjacent strands of the coil merge into one another, and run continuously through the helix from one end to the other. Compare this figure with Fig. 1, and the similarity in the arrangement of the lines of force is obvious. The front end of the helix acts, in fact, like the north pole of a magnet, and the further end like the south pole. If a small bar of iron be now pushed into the interior of this helix, the lines of force will run through it and magnetize it, converting it into an electro-magnet. The magnetic "field" of such an electro-magnet is shown in Fig. 8, which is reproduced from the actual figure made by iron filings. To magnetize the iron bar of the electro-magnet as strongly as possible the wire should be coiled many times round, and the current should be as strong as possible. This mode of making an iron rod or bar into a powerful magnet is adopted in every dynamo-electric machine. For, as will be presently explained, very powerful magnets are required, and these magnets are most effectively made by sending the electric currents through spiral coils of wire wound (as in Fig. 8) round the bars that are to be made into magnets.

Fig. 8

The reader will at this point probably be ready to jump to the conclusion that magnets and currents are alike surrounded by a sort of magnetic atmosphere, and such a view may help those to whom the subject is fresh to realize how such actions as we have been describing can be communicated from one magnet to another, or from a current to a magnet. Nevertheless such a conclusion would be both premature and inaccurate. Even in the most perfect vacuum these actions still go on, and the lines of force can still be traced. It is probably more correct to conclude that these magnetic actions are propagated through space not by special magnetic atmospheres, but by there being movements and pressures and tensions in the ether which is believed to pervade all space as a very thin medium more attenuated than the lightest gas, and which when subjected to electro-magnetic forces assumes a peculiar state, and gives rise to the actions which have been detailed in the preceding paragraphs.

Fig. 9.

The next point to be studied is the magnetic property of a single loop of the wire through which an electric current flows. Fig. 9 represents a single voltaic cell containing the usual plates of zinc and copper dipping into acid to generate a current in the old-fashioned way. This current flows from the zinc plate through the liquid to the copper plate, and from thence it flows round the wire ring or circuit back to the zinc plate. Here the lines of magnetic force in the surrounding space are no longer only whirls like those drawn in Fig. 4 and 6, for they react on one another and become nearly parallel where they pass through the middle of the ring. The thick arrows show the direction of the electric current, the fine arrows are the lines of magnetic force, and show the paths along which a free north pole would be urged. All the front face, where the arrow-heads are, will be like the north pole of a magnet. All the other face of the ring will be like the south pole of a magnet. Our ring resembles a flat magnet, one face all north pole the other face all south pole. Such a magnet is sometimes called a "magnetic shell."[1]

[Footnote 1: The rule for telling which face of the magnetic shell (or of the loop circuit) is north and which south in its magnetic properties is the following: If as you look at the circuit the current is flowing in the same apparent direction as the hands of a clock move, then the face you are looking at is a south pole. If the current flows the opposite way round to the hands of a clock, then it is the north pole face that you are looking at.]

Since the circuit through which the current is flowing has these magnetic properties, it can attract other magnets or repel them according to circumstances.

Fig. 10.

If a magnet be placed near the circuit, so that its north pole, N, is opposite that side of the circuit which acts as a south pole, the magnet and the circuit will attract one another. The lines of force that radiate from the end of the magnet, curve round and coalesce with some of those of the circuit. It was shown by the late Professor Clerk-Maxwell, that every portion of a circuit is acted upon by a force urging it in such a direction as to make it inclose within its embrace the greatest possible number of lines of force. This proposition, which has been termed "Maxwell's Rule," is very important, because it can be so readily applied to so many cases, and will enable one so easily to think out the actual reaction in any particular case. The rule is illustrated by the sketch shown in Fig. 10, where a bar magnet has been placed with its north pole opposite the south face of the circuit of the cell. The lines of force of the magnet are drawn into the ring and coalesce with those due to the current. According to Faraday's mode of regarding the actions in the magnetic field there is a tendency for the lines of force to shorten themselves. This would occur if either the magnet were pulled into the circuit, or the circuit were moved up toward the magnet. Each attracts the other, and whichever of them is free to move will move in obedience to the attraction. And the motion will in either case be such as to increase the total number of lines of force that pass through the circuit. Lest it should be thought that Fig. 10 is fanciful or overdrawn, we reproduce an actual magnetic "field" made in the manner described in the preceding article. Fig. 11 is a kind of sectional view of Fig. 10, the circuit being represented merely by two circular spots or holes above and below the middle line, the current flowing toward the spectator through the lower spot, and passing in front of the figure to the upper hole, where it flows down. Into this circuit the pole, N, is attracted, the tendency being to draw as many lines of force as possible into the embrace of the circuit.

Fig. 11.

So far as the reasoning about these mutual actions of magnets and currents is concerned, it would therefore appear that the lines of force are the really important feature to be understood and studied. All our reasons about the attractions of magnets could be equally well thought out if there were no corporeal magnets there at all, only collections of lines of force. Bars of iron and steel may be regarded as convenient conductors of the lines of force; and the poles of magnets are simply the places where the lines of force run out of the metal into the air or vice versa. Electric currents also may be reasoned about, and their magnetic actions foretold quite irrespective of the copper wire that acts as a conductor; for here there are not even any poles; the lines of force or magnetic whirls are wholly outside the metal. There is an important difference, however, to be observed between the case of the lines of force of the current, and that of the lines of force of the magnet. The lines of force of the magnet are the magnet so far as magnetic forces are concerned; for a piece of soft iron laid along the lines of force thereby becomes a magnet and remains a magnet as long as the lines of force pass through it. But the lines of force crossing through a circuit are not the same thing as the current of electricity that flows round the circuit. You may take a I loop of wire and put the poles of magnets on each side of it so that the lines of force pass through in great numbers from one face to the other, but if you have them there even for months and years the mere presence of these lines of force will not create an electric current even of the feeblest kind. There must be motion to induce a current of electricity to flow in a wire circuit.

Faraday's great discovery was, in fact, that when the pole of a magnet is moved into, or moved out of, a coil of wire, the motion produces, while it lasts, currents of electricity in the coil. Such currents are known as "induced currents;" and the action is called magneto-electric "induction." The momentary current produced by plunging the magnet pole into the wire coil or circuit is found to be in the opposite direction to that in which a current must be sent if it were desired to attract the magnet pole into the coil. If the reader will look back to Fig. 10 he will see that a north magnet pole is being attracted in from behind into a circuit round which, as he views it, the current flows in an opposite sense to that in which the hands of a clock move round. Now, compare this figure with Fig. 12, which represents the generation of a momentary induced current by the act of moving the north pole, N, toward a wire ring, which is in this case connected with a little detecter galvanometer, G. The momentary current flows round the circuit (as seen by the spectator from the front) in the same sense as the movement of the hands of a clock. The induced current which results from the motion is found, then, to be in a direction exactly opposed to that of the current that would itself produce the same movement of the magnet pole. If the north pole, instead of being moved toward or into the circuit, were moved away from the circuit, this motion will also induce a transient current to flow round the wire, but this time the current will be in the same sense as that in Fig. 10, in the opposite sense to that in Fig. 12. Pulling the magnet pole away sets up a current in the reverse direction to that set up by pushing the pole nearer. In both cases the currents only last while the motion lasts.

Fig. 12.

Now in the first article it was pointed out that the lines of force of the magnet indicate not only the direction, but the strength of the magnetic forces. The stronger the pole of the magnet is, the greater will be the number of lines of force that radiate from its poles. The strength of the current that flows round a circuit is also proportional to the number of lines of force which are thereby caused to pass (as in Fig. 9) through the circuit. The stronger the current, the more numerous the lines of force that thread themselves through the circuit. When a magnet is moved near a circuit near it, it is found that any alteration in the number of lines of force that cross the circuit is accompanied by the production of a current. Referring once more to Fig. 10, we will call the direction of the current round the circuit in that figure the positive direction; and to define this direction we may remark that if we were to view the circuit from such a point as to look along the lines of force in their own direction, the direction of the current round the circuit will appear to be the same as that of the hands of a clock moving round a dial. If the magnet, N S, be now drawn away from the circuit so that fewer of its lines of force passed through the circuit, experiment shows the result that the current flowing in circuit will be for the moment increased in strength, the increase in strength being proportional to the rate of decrease in the number of lines of force. So, on the other hand, if the magnet were pushed up toward the circuit, the current in the circuit would be momentarily reduced in strength, the decrease in strength in the current being proportional to the rate of increase in the number of lines of force.

Similar considerations apply to the case of the simple circuit and the magnet shown in Fig. 12. In this circuit there is no current flowing so long as the magnet is at rest; but if the magnet be moved up toward the circuit so as to increase the number of lines of force that pass through the circuit, there will be a momentary "inverse" current induced in the circuit and it will flow in the negative direction. While if the magnet were moved away the decrease in the number of lines of force would result in a transient "direct" current, or one flowing in the positive direction.

It would be possible to deduce these results from an abstract consideration of the matter from the point of view of the principle of conservation of energy. But we prefer to reserve this point until a general notion of the action of dynamo-electric machines has been given.

The following principles or generalized statements follow as a matter of the very simplest consequence from the foregoing considerations:

(a) To induce a current in a coil of wire by means of a magnet there must be relative motion between coil and magnet.

(b) Approach of a magnet to a coil or of a coil to a magnet induces currents in the opposite direction to that induced by recession.

(d) The more rapid the motion the stronger will be the momentary current induced in the coils (but the time it lasts will, of course, be shorter).

(e) The greater the number of turns in the coil the stronger will be the total current induced in it by the movement of the magnet.

These points are of vital importance in the action of dynamo electric generators. It remains, however, yet to be shown how these transient and momentary induction currents can be so directed and manipulated as to be made to combine into a steady and continuous supply. To bring a magnet pole up toward a coil of wire is a process which can only last a very limited time; and its recession from the coil also cannot furnish a continuous current since it is a process of limited duration. In the earliest machines in which the principle of magneto-electric induction was applied, the currents produced were of this momentary kind, alternating in direction. Coils of wire fixed to a rotating axis were moved past the pole of a magnet. While the coil was approaching the lines of force were increasing, and a momentary inverse current was set up, which was immediately succeeded by a momentary direct current as the coil receded from the pole. Such machines on a small scale are still to be found in opticians' shops for the purpose of giving people shocks. On a large scale alternate current machines are still employed for certain purposes in electric lighting, as, for example, for use with the Jablochkoff candle. Large alternate-current machines have been devised by Wilde, Gramme, Siemens, De Meritens, and others.--Engineering.