The Inventions, Researches and Writings of Nikola Tesla

Electric motors, power transmission and experimental lighting supply the practical questions behind this collection of Nikola Tesla's work. Thomas Commerford Martin brings together lectures, articles, discussions and accounts of inventions, with particular attention to polyphase currents and currents of high frequency and high potential. An opening biographical sketch follows Tesla's education and early engineering work, including his efforts to develop motors using a rotating magnetic field.

The technical material moves between the design of motors and transformers and experiments on light and materials. In one passage, Tesla describes testing carborundum under intense heat and preparing small buttons for use in experimental bulbs. Such details give readers a close view of how observations about materials enter the development of electrical apparatus. For readers interested in the history of engineering, the collection offers both explanations of devices and Tesla's own accounts of problems encountered at the laboratory bench.