I didn't look at it in those terms but you're right. What caught my attention with the hydraulic ram pump was the similarity to the quenched spark gap. The quenching of the spark gap is similar to the sudden closing of the waste water valve which sends a higher pressure impulse back through the system to open the other valve which is actually what does the work of pumping the water uphill.
It's the momentum of the water that drives the hydraulic system. I have had a hard time grasping the idea that electricity has momentum but it must if there is a force related to the electrical field - EMF. And the back pulse would be BEMF, although we usually think of BEMF as being generated by the collapse of a coil's field.
The hydraulic system works on the principal that when that momentum is abruptly stopped, it must go somewhere so it creates the back pulse which is contained in the water pipes. I suppose we could consider that back pulse in the quenched spark gap as Tesla's longitudinal wave but it wouldn't be contained in the wire because at high frequencies the current is on the skin of the wire. In the hydraulic system, however, it is definitely a longitudinal wave.
It occurs to me we could use two spark gaps as the two valves in the hydraulic system with the gap in the second one set slightly wider than that of the first so the second gap doesn't fire on the initial pulse but does fire on the higher pressure (voltage) back pulse.
I haven't really thought this through but there are quite a few similarities to Tesla's work.
He noted in one of his lectures that it was the suddenness of the quenching that was important which would be analogous to the waste valve closing. If it doesn't close rapidly enough the momentum leaks away and the back pulse does not occur.
He also mentioned somewhere that what he was doing was analogous to hydrodynamics but I can't locate that at the moment.
He spent a lot of effort developing "circuit interrupters" which were replacements for spark gaps. He has several different patents for them and they all use mercury as the conducting medium between the gap terminals. Mercury has an interesting property in that a pool of mercury will only allow current to flow in one direction. So that could be used in the second interrupter to insure there isn't any backflow of the impulse back to the initiating circuit.
There are some interesting notes in the text of this patent:
electrical-circuit-controller
Also the higher pipe receiving the higher pressure is open ended so it pumps into a tank or pond for storage. The "extra coil" in Tesla's magnifier can be open ended, in which case it charges the atmosphere around it. Or it an be connected to a capacitor like the mushroom button shaped one on top of Wardenclyffe which could then be looked at as the storage tank or pond.
And there is this (underlines added):
"When the terminals of a high tension induction coil [Fig. 31] are connected to a condenser, and the condenser is disruptively discharging into a circuit, we may look upon the arc playing between the spark gap as being a source of alternating, or generally speaking, undulating currents, and then we have to deal with the familiar system of a generator of such currents, a circuit connected to it, and a condenser bridging the circuit. The condenser in such case is a veritable transformer, and since the frequency is excessive, almost any ratio in the strength of the currents in both branches may be obtained. In reality the analogy is not quite complete, for in the disruptive discharge we have most generally a fundamental instantaneous variation of comparatively low frequency, and a superimposed harmonic vibration, and the laws governing the flow of currents are not the same for both."
Condenser as transformer - that matches the hydraulic ram pump in that the pump can move water to a location higher than the source.
Fundamental instantaneous variation - the closing of the waste valve that creates the back pulse
Superimposed harmonic vibration - the wave form of the back pulse from the hydraulic ram pump is essentially the same as that of the quenched spark gap.
I'm not sure where this takes us. More thinking to do.
Edit: the reason I posted this here is that I was thinking Leedskalnin used a hydraulic ram pump to fill a column to float his blocks up and then moved them from whatever floatation device he might be using. I actually like the original post here better though. So move these posts as you see fit.
It's the momentum of the water that drives the hydraulic system. I have had a hard time grasping the idea that electricity has momentum but it must if there is a force related to the electrical field - EMF. And the back pulse would be BEMF, although we usually think of BEMF as being generated by the collapse of a coil's field.
The hydraulic system works on the principal that when that momentum is abruptly stopped, it must go somewhere so it creates the back pulse which is contained in the water pipes. I suppose we could consider that back pulse in the quenched spark gap as Tesla's longitudinal wave but it wouldn't be contained in the wire because at high frequencies the current is on the skin of the wire. In the hydraulic system, however, it is definitely a longitudinal wave.
It occurs to me we could use two spark gaps as the two valves in the hydraulic system with the gap in the second one set slightly wider than that of the first so the second gap doesn't fire on the initial pulse but does fire on the higher pressure (voltage) back pulse.
I haven't really thought this through but there are quite a few similarities to Tesla's work.
He noted in one of his lectures that it was the suddenness of the quenching that was important which would be analogous to the waste valve closing. If it doesn't close rapidly enough the momentum leaks away and the back pulse does not occur.
He also mentioned somewhere that what he was doing was analogous to hydrodynamics but I can't locate that at the moment.
He spent a lot of effort developing "circuit interrupters" which were replacements for spark gaps. He has several different patents for them and they all use mercury as the conducting medium between the gap terminals. Mercury has an interesting property in that a pool of mercury will only allow current to flow in one direction. So that could be used in the second interrupter to insure there isn't any backflow of the impulse back to the initiating circuit.
There are some interesting notes in the text of this patent:
electrical-circuit-controller
Also the higher pipe receiving the higher pressure is open ended so it pumps into a tank or pond for storage. The "extra coil" in Tesla's magnifier can be open ended, in which case it charges the atmosphere around it. Or it an be connected to a capacitor like the mushroom button shaped one on top of Wardenclyffe which could then be looked at as the storage tank or pond.
And there is this (underlines added):
"When the terminals of a high tension induction coil [Fig. 31] are connected to a condenser, and the condenser is disruptively discharging into a circuit, we may look upon the arc playing between the spark gap as being a source of alternating, or generally speaking, undulating currents, and then we have to deal with the familiar system of a generator of such currents, a circuit connected to it, and a condenser bridging the circuit. The condenser in such case is a veritable transformer, and since the frequency is excessive, almost any ratio in the strength of the currents in both branches may be obtained. In reality the analogy is not quite complete, for in the disruptive discharge we have most generally a fundamental instantaneous variation of comparatively low frequency, and a superimposed harmonic vibration, and the laws governing the flow of currents are not the same for both."
Condenser as transformer - that matches the hydraulic ram pump in that the pump can move water to a location higher than the source.
Fundamental instantaneous variation - the closing of the waste valve that creates the back pulse
Superimposed harmonic vibration - the wave form of the back pulse from the hydraulic ram pump is essentially the same as that of the quenched spark gap.
I'm not sure where this takes us. More thinking to do.
Edit: the reason I posted this here is that I was thinking Leedskalnin used a hydraulic ram pump to fill a column to float his blocks up and then moved them from whatever floatation device he might be using. I actually like the original post here better though. So move these posts as you see fit.