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Description:
Mike"s Electric Stuff is a popular Web site with various odds and ends about electronics and related equipment. Ever wondered just how much fun microwaving a CD can be? That"s just the beginning of the wild things you can find. The site is divided into three main sections: antique glass (e.g., nixie tubes and neon lamps), Tesla coils and high-voltage stuff, and miscellaneous items such as lasers. Detailed instructions are given for several projects (perhaps crazy experiments would be the better term). A particularly well documented project shows how to build old-fashioned nixie tube clocks, and printed circuit board layouts are included.
Reviews and press coverage
Hi-Fi News article
This article, featuring Mike"s Electric Stuff appeared in HiFi News magazine, October 1998 issue, p.77. Oddly, they omitted to mention the only hi-fi related item on the site, the CD Jukebox!
Copyright notice : The text below is copyright HiFi News magazine and/or Stuart Perry.
WEB OF INTRIGUE
Even if your teacher never connected you to the mains, you could be turned on by some of the world"s most spectacular tubes!
By Stuart Perry
Hands up all those who, like me, drool over "big" valve amps with huge glowing 211 or 845 triodes with HT supplies of 1000V or more, thinking that they are the ultimate in the awesome stakes. Well, I"ve stumbled upon a web site which will make you realise that it"s time to get out of the short trousers! Before I describe what is surely the sexiest site on the net for us soldering iron junkies, I must pre-empt it with the serious message -- do not try this at home!
It all started when I was looking up information on live music in London for a friend who had come to stay. If you are want to finding out about live bands in the Capital then I can recommend [site no longer exists] This site,"More! Live Music in London", is provided courtesy of Mike Harrison, and it contains just about everything you could want to know about bands, venues and recordings.
However, at the bottom of the screen, in small print, the words "Ever wondered what happens if you put a couple of hundred thousand volts through a CD! Find out here!" grabbed my attention. I clicked my mouse on the link and it took me to the site "Mike"s Electric Stuff" This is where the fun begins -- if you have access to the internet then you simply have to visit this site and explore it in detail. It turns out Mike is also an authoritative enthusiast about all things that glow and spark!
Witness, if you dare, his experiments with Tesla Coils, special circular transformers which generate hundreds of thousands of volts from the mains supply. Seems that, in his spare time, Mike slips away to his garage and spectacularly "fries" old compact discs, surplus oscilloscope tubes, and even scrap laptop computer displays. Because a Tesla Coil generates such a high voltage, any objects placed in its path will encourage a series of electrical "arcs" to form, much like a localised lightning storm.
Mike also catalogues and collects electrical items, specifically historical valves and other similar devices. If you think a 211 triode is hairy, then have a look at Mike"s mercury arc rectifiers -- glass valves which convert AC to DC at power levels of several thousand watts!
On Mike"s site you can also learn about early valves, such as the fascinating Loewe 3NF Multivalve. This device was invented in 1926 to overcome the German tax"per-valve" on radio receivers. Loewe decided to build three individual triodes and a handful of other passive components into a single glass bulb, such that they could then claim to produce a "one valve radio" and hence offer it at a far lower price than the competition. Voila - the world"s first integrated circuit predates semiconductors by 30 years!
It it surprising to discover the sheer number of outwardly normal people who, despite conventional "day jobs", spend their leisure time experimenting with electronics and becoming authorities on practical design. I have a theory as to why this should be, and it all revolves around having had a memorable "hands-on" education in early life. When I was a teenager at school, were taught physics largely by practical demonstrations, many of which have now been deemed far too dangerous under the latest health and safety regulations, so modern kids are denied those unforgettable character-forming experiences. I will never forget what I learned in the classroom, especially the day that my physics master demonstrated the fact that resistances in series cause the applied voltage to be divided pro-rata across them. He asked 20 of us to form a human chain holding hands, and proceeded to connect us up to the mains!
He then took his trusty AVO meter and measured the voltage across each of us in turn, which was, as near as dammit, only 12 volts each (240 volts shared across 20 people, each of us being a "human resistor") which explained why none of us was electrocuted. Now, that"s what I call one helluva way to learn Ohm"s Law, and so it"s no wonder my generation is fascinated by the idea of experimenting with natural phenomena.
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Yahoo! pick of the week 22/5/00
Mike is one of those guys who likes to open up electronic gadgets, take a peek inside, then put them back together. He takes a real anatomical interest in the way machines work. He also has a huge collection of antique glass valves, neon lamps, Geissler tubes, Tesla coils, and Weston cells. He explains how each component works, who invented them, what they"re made of, and how you can take them apart. He also includes a diagram of his home audio/video setup that reads like a London Underground map.
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WorldVillage Family site of the day 7/6/00
Over the past century, electricity and electronics have changed the way we live, both by the devices that were invented, and how they were used. We put men on the moon, and movies on a small silver disk. In between there are thousands of other devices that were invented and created. Today"s FamSite looks at a site that features some of the building blocks that made those inventions possible.
The site is called Mike"s Electric Stuff, and is a site that is dedicated to nuts and bolts of basic electronics and electricity. Here you can find out about spark gap and triggered gap tubes, nixie tubes, tesla coils, and neodymium magnets. This site has guided tours of all these items and more. The information here is fascinating, something for anyone who is interested in how things work, and why. Of special interest is the old calculator section, where you can view some of the first calculators ever made, and who cost as much as some full size computers do today.
This is a great site for techno-geeks and armchair electronic wizards. It is also a valuable resource as a reference for older electronic components. This site would be a valuable one to bookmark.
There was not a good description of the site, so what follows is most of the text from the home page:
Antique Glass stuff
Loewe multi- valve The first ever integrated circuit, from 1926! The BIG stuff Serious glass. High-frequency valves plus klystrons & magnetrons. Spark gap and triggered gap tubes and small thyratrons.
Miniature valves
..and the cutest little CRT you"ll ever see...! Vintage valves Mercury Arc Rectifiers How you made DC before silicon. Lamps etc. Antique / unusual bulbs & arc tubes..
Neon lamps and neon strobe tubes. Geissler tubes pretty discharge tubes from before the days of neon. Assorted glass components Weston cells, crystals, geiger tubes, vacuum guage. Photoelectric Cells and photomultipliers.
Nixie tubes, dekatrons & counting tubes Digital glass stuff. Nixie Clock project Full construction details including PCB artwork. Advertisments for early electronic stuff incuding very early transistors & computing, from the early 1950s. Industrial Valve specs and data sheets Thyratrons, Ignitrons, cold-cathode tubes, power valves etc
Old technical books online
Old technical books covering obsolete technology New Mar "04 1966 Bauman Applications of Neon lamps and gas discharge tubes Very Clever Glassware including a glass analogue to digital converter and a 256 bit memory tube. Valve & Vintage electronic Links
Tesla coils and high-voltage stuff
Warning! Tesla coils and their ancillary equipment are VERY VERY dangerous and you should not even THINK about trying to make one unless you really understand the dangers of high-voltage electrical systems.
Tesla coil pictures Trying not to burn down my garage. Zapping CD"s What to do with that Spice Girls CD you got for Xmas. Lightbulb plasma globe Storm in a bulb. Laptop Hell Remember those "portable" PC"s with plasma displays?
Fun with Argon Inert gas getting slightly more ert. Zapping Electronic stuff Chip frying. High voltage demo at the Deutsches Museum, Munich. UK Teslathon
Corby "98 First UK teslathon.
UK Teslathon Corby "99 UK Teslathon
Cambridge "99 With AVI"s of coils and exploding stuff UK Teslathon Corby 2000 Fun with a surge generator Can-crushing, ballistic maglev and exploding stuff.
Jacob"s Ladders High-voltage flames Tesla Coil Motor Electric "wheel of fire" effects. Fun with Plasma in a xenon flash tube "Quick & Dirty" Marx Generator Big sparks - fast!
The Destruct-O-Tron Three Thousand Joules of danger!
The Jacobs-Ladder-O-Phone of fire!
A new twist on an old HV device
NEW! Apr "03 Marx Three
A million volts of fun
NEW! May "03
UK Teslathon Derby 2004
NEW! May "03
Sparks of Fire
High voltage AND flames - cool!
NEW! Jun "03 Amberley Teslathon 2004
NEW! Jun "03
Watch this amazing video of a 500KV power arc, rising to 3 storeys high! 50KV Electron Microscope PSU Info on high-power pulse switching devices trigatrons, thyratrons and various other -trons. Tesla coil and high-voltage links
Miscellaneous electric, science & laser stuff
Inside Electric Stuff - Ever wondered what electronic gadgets look like inside but were scared to get your screwdriver out ?
CD Jukebox 1000 CD"s at the press of a button. My Home AV system So complicated I had to draw myself a diagram! Neodymium magnets Turn a hard disk into a maglev device.
Mystery corner Odd components - can you figure them out ?
Old calculator collection. Ball-bearing motor Odd non- magnetic motor. How to make really good homebrew PCBs DIY PCMCIA Serial interface
Unusual digital clocks Argon laser power supply from surplus switchmode PSUs Miniature smoke machine for laser experimenters Fun with an argon laser
Fun with a BIG laser The lights go dim as the beam comes on.....
The mystery of the collapsing Lucozade bottles A strange phenomenon investigated. The Incredible Shrinking Chip
A nice demonstration of how much smaller chips have become over the last decade. A Laser that burns stuff!
Mike"s got a CO2 laser - be afraid, be very afraid..!
Backwards PC Case
An unusually useful case mod for plug-a-holics
New Mar "04 Canon EOS 300D/Rebel/Kiss stuff
Modifying EF extension tube, Changing focus screen
New Jun "04 Transparent electric stuff
New May "04 A Handy method for storage of surface-mount components
Build a cheap capacitance box
Dial-a-Farad New Jul "04 The Junk Box Oddments that don"t fit anywhere else... Muppet Alert Dumb emails received Science & miscellaneous links
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