Experiments and Observations on Electricity Made at Philadelphia in AmericaFranklin, Benjamin
History
Experiments and Observations on Electricity Made at Philadelphia in America
Franklin, Benjamin
Electricity -- Early works to 1850
21. On the principle, in § 7, that hooks of bottles, differently charged,
will attract and repel differently, is made, an electrical wheel, that
turns with considerable strength. A small upright shaft of wood passes at
right angles through a thin round board, of about twelve inches diameter,
and turns on a sharp point of iron fixed in the lower end, while a strong
wire in the upper-end passing thro' a small hole in a thin brass plate,
keeps the shaft truly vertical. About thirty _radii_ of equal length, made
of sash glass cut in narrow strips, issue horizontally from the
circumference of the board, the ends most distant from the center being
about four inches apart. On the end of every one, a brass thimble is fixed.
If now the wire of a bottle electrified in the common way, be brought near
the circumference of this wheel, it will attract the nearest thimble, and
so put the wheel in motion; that thimble, in passing by, receives a spark,
and thereby being electrified is repelled and so driven forwards; while a
second being attracted, approaches the wire, receives a spark, and is
driven after the first, and so on till the wheel has gone once round, when
the thimbles before electrified approaching the wire, instead of being
attracted as they were at first, are repelled, and the motion presently
ceases.--But if another bottle which had been charged through the coating
be placed near the same wheel, its wire will attract the thimble repelled
by the first, and thereby double the force that carries the wheel round;
and not only taking out the fire that had been communicated to the thimbles
by the first bottle, but even robbing them of their natural quantity,
instead of being repelled when they come again towards the first bottle,
they are more strongly attracted, so that the wheel mends its pace, till it
goes with great rapidity twelve or fifteen rounds in a minute, and with
such strength, as that the weight of one hundred _Spanish_ dollars with
which we once loaded it, did not seem in the least to retard its
motion.--This is called an electrical jack; and if a large fowl were
spitted on the upright shaft, it would be carried round before a fire with
a motion fit for roasting.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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