The Lifters successful replications
Experimenters Log Book
created on October 10th, 2001- JLN Labs
All informations in this page are published free and are intended for private/educational purposes and not for commercial applications

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Hello,JNaudin.

I achieved the flight of lifter that had 4 section. I'll send this picture and movie.

Good bye.

Yusuke Kudo   from Japan

Hello.
I am Daisuke Nakao, In Japan, 5m of Lifter was floated 15m.
Thank you for your consideration.

Daisuke Nakao

Click here to see more photos about this experiment

Hello Fellow Lifter Groupies!

I must first offer my sincere congratulations to both Jean-Louis and his tiny friend Orville for successfully completing their first living electronaut experiment. Most Excellent! Just another grand electrogravitic milestone (kilometerstone I guess in France) for the rest of us to catch up with, if we can.

Recently flew for the first time my own much more humble experiment, which I refer to as the Hex-Lifter (for images and web cam video,
check out my own budding lifter page found at http://www.serv.net/~only1egg/science/LifterPage.htm ) The overt reason behind this six-sided design is that personal experiments showed most of the leakage (arcing) occurred at the corners. This method of construction has twice as many corners, and with wider
angles than the standard lifter, thus allowing the electrogravitic field to spread itself around the cells somewhat more evenly. Or, that's the theory anyway… All the same, while I don't have much to contribute to the technical exchanges presented by some Lifter Group members, having build a few successful lifters now, I would like to offer a few more pragmatic observations to experimental newbies…

First of all, it can not be stressed enough that when building lifters… Build Them As Light As Possible! This is of course a skill that comes with practice, so by all means, construct a few lifters to develop the proper technique. You will find it rather amazing just how tough a balsa structure can be when correctly tensioned with tin foil and wire. My own construction technique includes a lapping joint between lengths of balsa, providing that extra bit of surface area to
hold them together. (not to mention that the little dab of glue is possibly the strongest part of the structure)  I also use very tiny pieces of balsa glued in place to reinforce these joints and corners, which seems to add very little weight, but increases strength tremendously. (watch out for those sticky fingers…) Another suggestion is to round off the tops of the side lengths of balsa, which I do by careful sanding prior to final assembly. This way, when you wrap the tin foil over the rail, it can be pulled down more tightly, thus avoiding more of those sharp, crinkled edges where the worst arcing can occur. (which is very bad for your power supply, by the way!)

Next, use the finest gauge of wire that you can get your hands on, as it makes a noticeable difference in emitter wire efficiency. If possible, splurge on a spool of Information Unlimited's ultra fine Stainless Steel Wire, which although sometimes challenging to work with during construction, really works quite well in flight. I also found that if you take regular clear tape, and roll it tightly with the sticky side out, it can be used on the uprights to wrap the wire around. Not only does it help hold the wire in place, but it makes it much easier to slide the emitter wire up and down for any necessary fine tuning between flights.

Finally, by all means do experiment virtually before actually constructing your lifter. It was most helpful to refer repeatedly to the Lifter Solver Calculator found at
http://jnaudin.free.fr/lifters/calc/thrust.htm . The primary reason for doing this is to accurately work within the Voltage/Amp conceptual box you have available, which seemingly is the only real limit to building those very larger lifters. Looking over the various designs coming forth from other experimenters, it appears that almost any configuration can be made to fly IF you remember to work within these Voltage/Amp limits.

Well, that's it for the moment, I hope these suggestions are of some use to those just starting out building their own lifters. Best of luck to everyone, let's keep those lifters flying, and remember to play safely with your high voltage power source. (I for one have a far more healthy respect for electricity, after mistakenly sticking my finger where it did not belong! OUCH!!)

Just Another Happy Lifter Maniac,
Richard Haider
Seattle WA

Bjr,
vous trouverez sur mon site quelques photos de mes expérimentations avec le lifter héxagonal de C.Dupré.

Salutations
D.Nardi
http://d.nardi.free.fr/lifter.htm

Cher M. Naudin,

Nous sommes un groupe de quatre élèves en terminale scientifique au lycée international de Strasbourg. Dans le cadre des TPE (travaux personnels encadrés), et du thème "Espace et mouvement", nous avons choisi la lévitation comme sujet pour notre travail, suite à l'article paru dans "Science et Avenir".

Après plusieurs tentatives, et une construction rigoureuse des lifters, nous avons réussi l'expérience avec des lifters du type basic.

Notre THT délivre 23 kV (issue d'une vieille télévision couleur), nous avons choisi une résistance de protection de valeur 4,7 KOhms. Quelle expérience impressionnante !

Merci pour votre travail,

Cordialement,

Stéphane HARTER,
Sébastien LUTZ
Andrew O'NEILL
Jean-Philippe ZORN

Cher M.Naudin

Cela fait déjà quelques temps que je ne donne plus de mes nouvelles et pour cause, mes expériences sur le basic lifter ont évolué.

Je me présente de nouveau, M. Julien Brette, étudiant en classes préparatoires scientifiques à Limoges. Je vous avais contacté il y a deux mois pour diverses questions sur votre fabuleux projet, à savoir celui du lifter.

A cette époque, mon emploi du temps ne me permettait pas de réaliser mes expériences, mais les vacances de noël m'ont permis d'y remédier. De plus, j' étudie maintenant ce projet avec un camarade ( Cyril Hospital ), ce qui est encore plus motivant.

Je vous rappelle aussi que l'étude du lifter fait l'objet d'un TIPE ( Travail d'Intérêt Personnel Encadré ), projet donnant lieu à une évaluation lors des concours d'admission aux écoles d'ingénieurs ( qui se dérouleront pour nous à la fin de cette année scolaire ).

Vous m'aviez demandé de faire un compte-rendu de nos avancées et voici mes ( ou plutôt nos maintenant) impressions:

_ après deux après-midi, nous avons enfin réalisé une lévitation du lifteur : en fait, nous avons effectué une première expérience mais le lifteur ne bougeait presque pas. C'est pourquoi nous avons changé de résistances ( pensant qu'elles nous consommaient trop de puissance ) ; nous avons aussi modifié le lifteur en l'allégeant et nous avons alors observé un léger saut du lifteur ( source d'encouragement ! ).
_ c'est alors que nous nous apercevons que la THT ne délivrait que 24 kV. Nous avons donc cherché d'autres écrans. Nous renouvelons ainsi nos expériences avec un moniteur délivrant jusqu'à 30 kV. Et là miracle ! , ça marche. Cependant, une étincelle mit le feu à notre lifteur ; nous avons donc coupé le courant et en déchargeant le lifteur, nous avons "grillé" la THT ( pour cause de résistance de 60 k-ohms seulement, et cela faute de mieux )
_ après maintes expériences, les résultats ont été enfin concluants, que dis-je, impressionnants ( encore mieux que sur les vidéos ! ).
_ désormais, le lifteur V 2.0 vole également.

Maintenant, place à l'interprétation : nous essayons de comprendre les phénomènes cause de cette lévitation, sans prétendre les démontrer, loin de là s'en faut ! Nous aurons par ailleurs quelques questions à vous soumettre.

En attendant que nous vous envoyons les photos, tous nos meilleurs vœux pour cette année 2003 en espérant qu’elle soit propice au lifter et à vos expérimentations.

PS : toutes nos amitiés à Orville !!!

Julien Brette - Limoges ( France )

Cher Jean-Louis,

quelques mots pour vous annoncer qu'avec mon fils Vivien (12ans1/2) nous sommes parvenus à reproduire votre expérience Lifter 2.

Nous avons eu cependant quelques déboires:
d'abord en utilisant un ancien moniteur noir et blanc : aucun résultat (quelques frémissements du papier alu)
ensuite avec un moniteur couleur datant de 1990:
manque de puissance occasionnant des instabilités de vol (je n'ai aucun des caractéristiques de ce matériel)

En réglant les fils d'arrimage en nylon je suis parvenu à le stabiliser mais à seulement 10 cm au dessus de la table.

Le support d'envol utilisé était constitué d'une plaque de carton millimétré posé sur une plaque de polystyrène expansé de 5 cm d'épaisseur.

Amicalement votre

Jean-Pierre TURMEL
Vivien TURMEL
ROUEN FRANCE

Voici le lifter V2 selon vos plans. J'ai vaporisé un produit pour les chapeaux de distributeur pour prévenir les arcs entre les deux électrodes, ca marche. Quelqu'un a-t-il pu expliquer pourquoi la force résultante est toujours dans le même sens indépendemment de la polarité des électrodes? Ce comportement me semble en contradiction avec l'explication mettant en cause le vent ionique ou électrocinétique.

Merci pour avoir succité en moi la rage de reproduire au plus vite ce phénomène extraordinaire.

A suivre.

Bien à vous,
Michel Dumont Qc. Canada

Hi!

I am Martin Filipiak, from Szczyrk, Poland. Earlier I built other device,
(you can see this at: http://www.pibn.topnet.pl and my home server http://80.49.111.128/ ).
I am amateur constructor and this is my hobby.

So, I built some lifters.
As a power source I used only 2N3055, trafo and voltage multiplier cascade from color TV.
It produces about 30 kV.
My favourite lifter is "titan". In my opinion, It look is very futuristic...
I built too for my lifters "aerodrom". I showed this lifter on the Forum
unconventional contrivance and ideas in Wroclaw (5-6 october).
There I was with my team-PIE.
This lifter doesn't need connect to ground.
This device is fantastic!

technical info:
-triangle lifter
lifter height: 5 cm
aluminium sheet height: 2 cm
total lenght aluminium sheet: 36 cm

-titan:
lifter height: 6cm
aluminium sheet height: 2 1/2 cm
total length aluminium sheet: 58 cm
gap: 3cm
*This lifter was runing 46 hour non-stop.

Photos:
008.jpg it is my third lifter, but first function.
009.jpg other view this lifter.
011.jpg this lifter with him admission.
012.jpg ready to fly?!
013.jpg "titan" it is my favourite lifter!
014.jpg zoom for "titan".
019.jpg I with my lifters
034.jpg and my photo...

I have too many films and photos this lifters...

Martin Filipiak.
<good bye>

Well it took a little patience but I have learnt a lot . I was suffering from arcing so the lifters didnt fly for long, the arcing was especially bad at the point where
the +ve supply joined the lifter, I soon realised that I needed to keep the +ve supply as near as vertical to the lifter as posible. This may be due to the fact that I am using 0.08mm stainless steel wire which is not coated. I also believe that I am not getting a very high output from the 15" dell monitor, as I am severely restricted to the weight of the lifter.

I followed Jean Louis's plan for the lifter 3 which has basla wood at the top and bottom of the foil (I even think the balsa wood was thinner than he suggested)  but still I didnt get any lift - just a bit of movement. So with my scalpel in hand I hacked off the bottom balsa wood - and hey presto got instant lift. As this was a version 3 it was very stable, and the only problem I have now is the monitor's power supply cuts out after 10-15 seconds, even without any arcing .

I have also made a single cell out of kids plastic straws, this is quite good as you dont need any glue to make the triangle and vertical supports for the corona wire. I also found that using the plastiv straw on the vertical allowed me to slide the corona wire up and down very easily and was able to use this to test a variety of heights - which only goes to prove what we all know that 30 - 35mm seems to be the optimum height for the +ve wire ( at least with this lifter anyway)

Hope some of this helps any one elso just starting out!
Here's to bigger and bigger lifters!!
Alistair Gillan

Mr. Naudin and other lifters,

I builded a "tiny" lifter consist of a single cell size 8cm, alu 2,5 cm.. wire distance 3 cm (see the log)...
I was playing around with payload ( we go for the 100g of course :) ) and discovered something strange...
When placed a peace of normal paper on top of the alu foil.. about every centimeter a hilighted spot appears. So it seems that the electrons are gathering on these spots... (See my attached movie),

Does this mean that the smallest cell you can make is about 2 cm for each side ??.. Have you seen this effect before ?....

Regards
Robert de Roode,
and a Merry Christmas and a Happy New year.
(contest for Next year, a floating christmas tree) ;)

I am working for EADS Launch Vehicle at Les Mureaux in France and i discover your project in "Sciences&Avenir".  

I built a lifter as described in your web file : Lifter V2.0   The characteristics of my lifter are :

• weight  10 g
•  the wire is 0,1 mm diameter (coming from a transfo) and is at 25 mm from the aluminium layer
• the aluminium layer is about 50 mm hight (400mm side)
• the power is 30 KV coming from an old color screen for PC

End more, i could decrease the lengh between the wire and the layer to 20 mm witout having to much flashes.   You will find a photography in appendix.   I will study now the theory to manufacture a model more optimized.  

Cordialement
Jean-Luc PIGOT

Hi all,

First a tried a quite difficult model, wich did not work (of course) so I decided to start with the default model (smart eh!)... But, I build it with different sizes than the "original" building scheme suggested and with drinking straws (rietjes) which are cheaper (dutch eh!) and also very light!....

Specifications of my Tiny Lifter:...

1 drining straw (wrapped with alu foil) and bended into a triangle...

Sidesup, a quarter of a drinking straw, and on top a copper wire (smells good)
Sizes:
Each side is 8 cm
Height of the foil is 2.5 cm, wrapped on top on a drinking straw
Copper wire is 3cm above the foil
Power source, Iyama 19Inch color monitor.....

Note: it is a very unstable model, but it works :)

Regards to you all builders,
Robert

Cher Monsieur

J'ai découvert votre site,dont je vous félicite,depuis peu de temps et je dois vous avouer qu'il m'a enthousiasmé.
De ce fait j'ai rapidement voulu m'essayer à construire mon premier Lifter1 de 20 cm de coté, que j'ai alimenté avec un vieux moniteur couleur Compaq et une resistance serie de 330 Kohms .
Premiers résultats : résistance brulée
balsa brulé
puis après réparations l'envol mais très instable
Fort de cette première expérience j'ai remis çà en construisant un autre Lifter1 plus petit cette fois (11 cm de coté ) et en soignant particulierement l'équilibrage. J'ai aussi porté la valeur de la résistance à 1.8 Mohms .

Alors là c'est l'envol , un vol parfaitement stable dont j'ai tiré une grande satisfaction.
Seul point négatif, à la suite de chaque série d'éssais je m'enrhume je dois faire une overdose d' ions négatifs.

Acceptez Monsieur mes plus cordiales salutations.

PS: ci-joint une photo de mon modeste résultat 

Hi Jean-Louis,

Just a note to tell you about some lifter experiments I performed with a friend, based on the information on your site. The two experimenters were myself and JJ Furman.  It was a team project.

I've attached a photo of our lifter taking off.  Additional details, pictures, and movies can be found at:
http://www.hollenback.net/index.php/LifterExperiment

Thanks for the great web site!
P.
Philip J. Hollenback

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