@Koen1
Your link to the Neo Magnet experiment on the website was quite interesting,
it answered one of my questions "What direction does magnetism draw electrons?"
hehe well that's the funny thing, theory says magnetism does not exert a 'pull'
on electrons along the magnetic field axis at all... At most, a perpendicular potential
difference should arise as in the Hall effect, but this 'drawing' of electrons from a magnets
poles should not happen according to just about every established theory.
That's also why it's so cool.
I was thinking that the direction of the B field should match the direction electrons are pulled.
Well, according to
http://jlnlabs.online.fr/vsg/protelf.htm that is indeed what Vall?e said...
If that device could overcome the problem of overheating the Neo it should work.
Yes, one would think so. Although it is of course possible that the neo magnet heats up due
to internal electron interactions that also cause the spark to be longer... In which case the
longer spark effect causes the magnet to heat up and cooling it might decrease the spark effect.
I was considering mixing silica gel with graphite and placing it in a paper tube.
To what effect, exactly? To allow for a better or extended path for the electrons to follow and
hopefully reduce heating effects?
From your crystal cell experiments do you have an idea what ratio of gel to graphite
I would need, to get about 2 ohms per inch at say 4mm width.
Does heating silica gel cause it to melt?
Well generally I don't set out to produce specific resistance materials in my experiments,
I tend to work from my theory on the crystal unit and take it from there...
And I know I took readings of mixes with silica and graphite, but I've just dug through the
documentation I have here and I can't find the report on those tests... so unfortunately
I can't give you any clear info on what ratios I tried and what the resistance of those were
at the moment. I shall look around my workshop when I'm there again, perhaps I left the
info there. Or, if we're very unlucky, I may have thrown it out during a vigilant cleaning session...
After all, I do recall that most of the mixes I made with a certain minimum amount of graphite,
something like 70%+, were good conductors with relatively low resistance, and that was
not what I was looking for at the time...
As to the silica gel, silica itself melts around the 1700 degrees Celcius and since silica gel
is basically silica synthesised from sodium silicate (which melts around 1000 degrees),
it should melt around that same temperature. (If impure it may contain traces of sodium silicate
and may melt at slightly lower temp)
That kind of temperature needs either a kiln for controlled melting, a melting crucible and furnace,
or for a rough and less controllable way putting it in a fire would probably reach such temperatures...
But since carbon combusts at 400 degrees Celcius and silica gel tends to retain water very well,
I would expect quite a bit of the carbon if not all of it to oxidise at temperatures 4 times that high...
May I suggest trying "waterglass" to make your carbon-based material?
"Waterglass" is a very watery solution of sodium silicate, and is sometimes used to make
conductive adhesive by simply adding some conductive powder to it (usually metals such
as silver or basically anything that doesn't chemically react with it like for example aluminium
does as soon as it comes into contact with the stuff) and mixing it up well untill you have
a paste. It can be applied and left to dry, or one can apply heat to it to have it dry faster.
If I'm not mistaken, heating it to 200 degrees for a brief period will almost instantly solidify it.
So I would suggest mixing a little 'waterglass' with carbon powder untill it is a nice paste,
then fill your tube with that, then either leave it to dry which can take a couple of days depending
on the temperature and humidity (dry and warm environment probably solidifies it within a day or two),
or put it in an oven on low heat for a while to speed up the solidification.
You'll have to do a few little experiments to determine the exact resistance of this mix, and
may need to add some other powder to increase or decrease that as you see fit. Oxide powders
are generally good for increasing resistance in that respect.
Hope that helps?
Oh, P.S., you may need to use something other than paper because waterglass tends to bind with
it quite well and it will be hard to remove the paper if it does. Perhaps covering the paper in a layer
of carbon/graphite powder may counter this? (One of the revolutionary uses of graphite powder back
in the day was its use as a coating for cannonball molds, as it kept the cannonballs from sticking to
the mold which they apparently did very often before the graphite came into use. History, always usefull.
)
And another thing I have not tried yet with the 'waterglass' is using the blotch-type oven/kitchen paper...