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The war of the currents was a series of events surrounding the introduction of competing electric power transmission systems in the late 1880s and early 1890s. It grew out of two lighting systems developed in the late 1870s and early 1880s: arc lamp street lighting running on high-voltage alternating current (AC), and large-scale low-voltage direct current (DC) indoor incandescent lighting ...
It was powered by two Siemens & Halske alternators rated 30 hp (22 kW), 2 kV at 120 Hz and used 200 series-connected Gaulard 2-kV/20-V step-down transformers provided with a closed magnetic circuit, one for each lamp. Few months later it was followed by the first British AC system, which was put into service at the Grosvenor Gallery, London. It ...
The abbreviations AC and DC are often used to mean simply alternating and direct, as when they modify current or voltage. [2] [3] Direct current may be converted from an alternating current supply by use of a rectifier, which contains electronic elements (usually) or electromechanical elements (historically) that allow current to flow only in ...
Electricity generation at central power stations started in 1882, when a steam engine driving a dynamo at Pearl Street Station produced a DC current that powered public lighting on Pearl Street, New York. The new technology was quickly adopted by many cities around the world, which adapted their gas-fueled street lights to electric power.
Year Event 600 BCE: Ancient Greek philosopher Thales of Miletus described static electricity by rubbing fur on substances such as amber. 1600: English scientist William Gilbert coined the word electricus after careful experiments. He also explained the magnetism of Earth. 1660: German scientist Otto von Guericke invented a device that creates ...
2 Signature Thomas Davenport (July 9, 1802 – July 6, 1851) was a Vermont blacksmith who, with his wife Emily, constructed the first American DC electric motor in 1834.
"Dynamo Electric Machine" (end view, partly section, U.S. patent 284,110) A dynamo is an electrical generator that creates direct current using a commutator.Dynamos were the first electrical generators capable of delivering power for industry, and the foundation upon which many other later electric-power conversion devices were based, including the electric motor, the alternating-current ...
John Gray also invented a belt machine about 1890. [4] Another more complicated belt machine was invented in 1903 by Juan Burboa. [ 1 ] [ 5 ] A more immediate inspiration for Van de Graaff was a generator W. F. G. Swann was developing in the 1920s in which charge was transported to an electrode by falling metal balls, thus returning to the ...