Grimeton SAQ 17,2 kHz alternator start-up

From the transmission July 2, 2023

[christopherleubner]

Believe it or not this is a big ULF transmitter that generates the carrier using electromechanical methods. Literally is a big alternator with lots of poles and a big disk in the middle. Modulation is by varying power to the electromagnets. ❤

[ms-twsj]

A little bit of background explanation of what this does and, what's it's purpose is, would be nice.

[RadioSvit]

Is this a Fessenden alternator, a unique mechanical long-wave radio transmitter from those amazing times, when there were no radio tubes yet? Are such transmitters still preserved somewhere? . How long have I been looking for such a video and how glad I am that I finally found it. Many thanks to the author

[wellgoahead]

Been there on a tour 35y ago amazing place and antenna system were you need a car to see it all, they used to activate it once a year to send a keymess to us, don't know if it still active but very very cool electromechanical device and solution to a transmitter. Definetly you get the mad scientist feeling walking around fluid resistors cells and 2 hand switches and motors and alternators big as small house and smells of oil and ozone, like a time machine back in good old times🙂

[smyes]

Don't miss the output transmit frequency display on top of the control panel, at the end of the video. :)

[nmgt]

Sounds more like a big industrial machine than telecommunication equipment. broadcasted long wave radio before vacuum tubes came out (pre 1920s). Motor at left, generator at right. Such a generator was called an Alexanderson unit. MacKay Radio and Rocky Point had such installations on Long Island.

[Darkk]

Fascinating to see this as mechanical work of art built over 100 years ago. So organic to see this in action vs pure electronic of conversion of AC to DC these days.

[douglasdunn]

Wish there were more of them around still. Love to copy their cw note!

[keithgarland]

What a great looking engine, very well kept. Certainly makes a change from a standard stationary engine.

[markgohl]

Very impressive machine. Are these of the salient pole type, which passes a slotted disk though vast number of pole pairs energized with DC ?

[UQRXD]

My God such a thing. I never saw any thing like it. Thanks.

[vladimus]

Imagine living your life I'm the countryside, and the seeing, and hearing something this "high-tech". Truly the stuff of Jules Verne. So good this history is preserved for all to experience.

[vvdvlas]

Передавач для радіостанції на наддовгих хвилях потужністю 200 кВт. Довжина хвилі 17, 4км.
Використовувався для зв'язку між Європою (Швеція) та США телеграфом.
Transmitter for a radio station on ultra-long waves with a power of 200 kW. The wavelength is 17.4 km.
It was used to communicate between Europe (Sweden) and the USA by telegraph.

[kleetus]

What is the driven motor starting method? Wound rotor with a couple of different rotor resistances? I didn't see brushes on the drive motor so I'm assuming it's AC driven, 3000 RPM 2 pole?

[BjarneLinetsky]

I have heard that the rotors of these alternators had such a high tangential velocity that they were polished by friction with the air....

[CATech]

i wonder what the power output is. and what station it powered. you can see the shaft rotation speed increase at the begining of spool up. it's interesting to listen to the whine of the high frequency output go out of hearing range as the gear whine of the speed increaser over comes the drive motor hum.

[frommarkham]

17, 200hz AC output?

I guess that's how huge amounts of high frequency AC was generated before we had power electronics(like vacuum tubes and solidstate semiconductor transistors)

[glasslinger]

Did they multiply the output frequency or use it directly? It would seem difficult to make an effective antenna for that low of a frequency.

[Renville]

Would have been nice if consideration had been made for deaf people wanting to know what is being said… too many people refuse to enable closed captions on their videos.

[danielbedrossian]

Ahh yes, the anty mass spectro meter is charging up calmly a resonant cascade scennerio.