During the tea-break at an engineering seminar held recently in Lahore, a number of fellow engineers of standing were, individually and collectively, asked if they knew the great Serbian-American inventor Dr Nikola Tesla, a contemporary of Edison and Marconi. Not-surprisingly, answer of many was in negative, whereas, a few said that they had just heard the name. To be honest, months ago even we, the writers, were not familiar with the numerous scientific and technological achievements of the genius whose experiments became the basis of many inventions of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, such as radio, microwave and the commercial use of electricity, to name only a few.
During the tea-break at an engineering seminar held recently in Lahore, a number of fellow engineers of standing were, individually and collectively, asked if they knew the great Serbian-American inventor Dr Nikola Tesla, a contemporary of Edison and Marconi. Not-surprisingly, answer of many was in negative, whereas, a few said that they had just heard the name. To be honest, months ago even we, the writers, were not familiar with the numerous scientific and technological achievements of the genius whose experiments became the basis of many inventions of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, such as radio, microwave and the commercial use of electricity, to name only a few.
Tesla created history for inventing Alternating Current (AC) that laid the foundations of modern electrical industry and ultimately became the most widely used system of transmission of electric power over long distances. A multi-faceted personality, Nikola Tesla was a mechanical engineer by qualification, excelling in many disciplines though.
He was an inventor of the rotating magnetic field and of complete system of generation and long distance distribution of electrical energy. Also known as “Father of Physics”, he has written books on fundamental concepts of matter, energy, magnetism and gravity. He practically demonstrated wireless electrical power transmission over long distance as early as in 1891, and had his banker not backed out at the last minute the world today would have seen cable-less power transmission through static electricity all over. A prolific inventor and researcher, Tesla has over 700 patents in 26 countries. His is a legacy of brilliance and enigma.
Later, he invented new types of turbines, pumps, speed indicators and flow meters etc., and did mathematical modelling in the field of hydrology. His work for renewable hydropower is pioneering as he developed a turbine-generator of 75MW capacity, transmitting power 32km away. He won the contract for the design and setting up of the very first hydropower AC generation power station on the Niagara Falls in a bitter contest with the much more powerful Edison, a committed proponent of DC systems. In 1897, Tesla researched radiation which led to setting up the basic formulation of cosmic rays. He claimed to have developed the art of Telautomatics, a form of robotics, as well as the technology of remote control. Tesla foresaw inter-planetary communications and satellites, and today’s cell-phone owes to his ideas and theories.
Born in 1856 in the village Smilijan, in today’s Croatia, as Serbian national, Tesla was a principled and a humble man, who stood way above his fellow inventor Thomas Edison (1847-1931). Perhaps a victim of racial discrimination, Tesla remained unsung during his life, even perhaps, because of his bitter and more influential adversary Edison. The two of them were well known in America in those days for the so called "AC-DC War". The 1915 Noble Prize for Physics was to be jointly shared by Tesla and Edison, but Tesla declined and none could get it. Earlier, Tesla was distressed when, in 1909, the Nobel Prize for Radio went to Marconi. Known as the inventor of radio, Marconi had in fact reproduced the apparatus Nikola had registered years ago. Tesla had been nominated for the 1912 Nobel Prize for his experiments with tuned circuits using high voltage high frequency resonant transformers.
His many achievements, which include discoveries of induction motor and rotating magnetic field, design of AC generation machines, major contribution of the cosmos, wireless transmission of electrical energy, design of rocket engine, experiments with solar energy, achieving ultra high vacuum and x-rays etc., are testimony to his matchless engineering genius. Tesla Coil, a gadget which projects lightning like bolts (millions of volts of electricity) and sparks in spectacular fashion, is a popular feature in science museums the world over.
After his split with Edison who failed to honour his payment commitment for redesigning his antiquated DC machines, Tesla joined hands with Westinghouse under a profit sharing arrangement. But after Westinghouse faced financial problems he approached Tesla for relief. A generous man, Tesla released Westinghouse of the profit sharing commitment to help him, and never received a penny even after Westinghouse was back in profits. Tesla, who made his first million dollar at the age of 40, died nearly penny-less, in 1943 in New York at the age of 87.
Following his death, he was almost forgotten by the 1950s. Nikola regained fame and recognition as the foremost inventor only when his homeland Serbia launched his contributions in subsequent years and constructed Nikola Tesla Museum in Belgrade. The museum houses valuable collection of Tesla’s some 160,000 original documents, 2,000 books/journals, 1,200 historical technical exhibits, 1,000 plans and drawings and 1,500 photos/photo-plates of original technical objects, instruments, apparatus and prototypes.
Many companies in Europe and the US were named and renamed after Tesla. He was inducted into the Inventors’ Hall of Fame as late as in 1975. The Belgrade Nikola Tesla Airport is named in his honour. The largest power plant in Serbia is the “TPP Nikola Tesla”. Currency notes, coins and postage stamps carried his picture and many other honours presented to him in Croatia, Austria, Romania and the Czech Republic. His monuments are erected in Niagara Falls and Belgrade. A crater on the moon and an asteroid is also named after Tesla. And recently a new beautiful sports car has been named after him.
An American science writer Margaret Cheney says: When he was five, Tesla built a small waterwheel quite unlike those he had seen in the countryside. It was smooth, without paddles, yet it spun evenly in the current. Years later he was to recall this fact when designing his unique blade-less turbine that was demonstrated in 1906 and patented in 1913. Gifted with great insight, Tesla would visualise an invention in his mind with full details and extreme precision, including all dimensions and tolerances, before proceeding to construction stage. Conceiving all ideas within his mind, he would be able to undertake complete manufacturing without the need to putting design and sketches or drawings on paper. This he practiced for about thirty years of his earlier professional life.
His name has been honoured with an international unit of magnetic flux density, called “Tesla” (symbol ‘T’). Efforts are being made to proclaim his birthday, July 10, as the Nikola Tesla Day by the United Nations to be celebrated globally. He is among the 100 Greatest Americans on the Discovery Channel. Books on Tesla include 22 biographies, 23 books on Tesla Coils, 22 books on Wireless, 9 on Turbo-machinery and another 3 on Teleforce and Teledynamics. Indeed, he was among those practical engineering researchers who changed the world. Dr BA Behrend (1875—1932), Vice President of the world’s largest professional association, the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), had complimented Tesla by re-phrasing Alexander Pope’s lines on Newton: “Nature and Nature’s laws lay hid in night:
God said, Let ‘Tesla’ be and all was light.” Rightly, Dr Behrend had added: Tesla left nothing to be done by those who followed him.
The writers are engineers
