Edison was at a bad disadvantage in the area of power transmission. DC is easy to understand. Once you get Ohm's law and power law down, the DC world is yours! But AC is another animal, that makes you drown in mathematics, and that's what Edison couldn't grapple with. The senior year in electrical engineering is a swamp of calculations invovolving power transmission, phase angles, reactive power, and all that stuff. Poor old TAE just couldn't handle it. He had quite a campaign for DC going for a while, but AC was the winner. It could never have been otherwise.
> [Original Message] > From: Peter Fraser <pjfra...@alamedanet.net> > To: Antique Phonograph List <phono-l@oldcrank.org> > Date: 11/21/2007 10:58:37 AM > Subject: Re: [Phono-L] Last Con Edison Direct Current Customer Is History > > and this: > > Westinghouse responded angrily. "Yes, the alternating current will > kill people. So will dynamite and whiskey." > > On Nov 21, 2007, at 7:51 AM, Peter Fraser wrote: > > > i think i remember a quote from TAE during the time he and > > westinghouse were debating AC vs. DC in the public forum...which > > included bizarre demonstrations involving test electrocutions of an > > elephant and a condemned prisoner...that was along the lines of > > "Westinghouse's current will kill you all" > > > > came up empty, but in trying to find it, i found a sweet little page > > of TAE quotes: > > > > http://www.thomasedison.com/edquote.htm > > > > > > On Nov 21, 2007, at 6:21 AM, msprin...@juno.com wrote: > > > >> My apartment building powered its elevators with DC current until > >> last year. Many years ago Con Edison supplied us with a > >> transformer to turn AC current into DC current so they wouldn't > >> have to supply us with the DC current, and then finally paid us to > >> switch the elevators to AC current directly. > >> > >> -- "Loran T. Hughes" <lo...@oldcrank.com> wrote: > >> Just in case anyone missed the news: > >> > >> http://money.cnn.com/news/newsfeeds/articles/marketwire/0328895.htm > >> > > > > _______________________________________________ > > Phono-L mailing list > > http://phono-l.oldcrank.org > > _______________________________________________ > Phono-L mailing list > http://phono-l.oldcrank.org
