Produced by Chris Curnow, Paul Marshall and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive) Transcriber’s Notes: Underscores “_” before and after a word or phrase indicate _italics_ in the original text. Carat symbol “^” designates a superscript. Small capitals have been converted to SOLID capitals. Illustrations have been moved so they do not break up paragraphs. Typographical errors have been silently corrected but other variations in spelling and punctuation remain unaltered. HISTORY OF THE TRANSFORMER. BY F. UPPENBORN, EDITOR OF THE “CENTRALBLATT FÜR ELEKTROTECHNIK,” AND CHIEF OF THE ELECTRO-TECHNICAL TESTING STATION IN MUNICH. _TRANSLATED FROM THE GERMAN._ [Illustration] E. & F. N. SPON, 125, STRAND, LONDON. NEW YORK: 12, CORTLANDT STREET. 1889. PREFACE. As of late the employment of alternating current transformers has largely increased and become of great importance, indeed as they are called upon to play a striking part in electric lighting from central stations, the author has thought a short notice of the development of this invention would possess some interest. This task appeared to be so much the more pressing, as many distorted versions of the invention and its priority have found place in the technical journals. The author has not let the reading of the large number of patents discourage him, and hopes that the following plain and concise statement of these researches will contribute towards the forming of a correct judgment as to the services rendered by the several inventors. THE AUTHOR. HISTORY OF THE TRANSFORMER. As we wish to write of those discoveries which led up to the invention of the transformer, we must go back to a time, old as compared with the modern development of electrotechnics. For the starting-point of our observations we shall take Faraday, who, like Newton in mechanics, led the way in the domain of electricity, and whose name stands in the most intimate relations with all inventions for the mechanical production of the electric current, and therefore with the later development of electrotechnics. [Sidenote: Faraday, 1831.] The most important discovery for which we have to thank Faraday is that of induction. This discovery was made by him in the year 1831, and intimated to the philosophical world in a paper read on the 24th November, 1831, appearing in the Transactions of the Philosophical Society in the year 1832.