There’s no point in pretending that I have human readers, so might as well screw around and do some actual science. The originals of these two items, written in 2024, are Bot Attractors. The bots love to “read” them. I’ve replaced the text of the originals with frequency-typical random. We’ll see if they still get the same amount of “reads” now that they’re utterly meaningless to a human. The real text of the original is here now so I can still read it if I want.
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Marconi also used a buzzer in his system for the same two purposes, with a different flavor.
(1) Like the Model T spark coil, the buzzer was needed to trigger a repeated inductive response in the high-voltage secondary of the transformer. Each flip of the transformer sent a brief pulse of high potential difference across the spark gap. (2) The buzz made the spark gap easy to hear in a receiver, which would otherwise be picking up just an instantaneous click on each press of the key.
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This is a photo from a mirror-scanning oscillograph similar to the GenRad unit I featured last month. The time axis is vertical, starting at the top.
After the spark from the induction coil reaches the breakover voltage of the air in the spark gap, a strong current flows for an instant, which then overshoots, charging the two terminals oppositely with a weaker voltage. This discharges the other way, for about a dozen bounces before the overshoot can’t overcome the breakdown voltage. A real lightning stroke works the same way on a vastly larger scale. The vibration within this brief bouncing is the radio frequency produced by the spark gap, which is broadly and poorly tuned, usually around 300 kilocycles, depending on the width of the gap. Without the buzzer repeating this action about 100 times a second, there would be no way to form longer buzzes and shorter buzzes for dashes and dots.
Sine-wave radio was possible in the early era, but only when generated by a fast-turning alternator. Properly tuned radio, capable of carrying speech and music, had to wait for vacuum tubes.
Polistra's Mill 