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Re: Electrostatic shielding



On Wed, 31 Jan 2001, Michael Edmiston wrote:

Wow. We certainly have a range of answers on this one. And I believe most
of them are wrong. I believe Joseph Bellina and Bill Beaty have it correct.

I first noticed the problem when trying to explain VandeGraaff machines
and the Faraday "ice pail" effect. I drew a crude diagram (which would be
nice to see as an animation with an e-field plotting program.)

http://www.amasci.com/emotor/icepail.gif

Feed the above "faraday ice pail" with a constant supply of small charged
spheres, and you've got a VDG machine.

I heard that VandeGraaff's first device had a belt covered with small
pieces of metal foil. Later he figured out that sharp needles could add
and remove charges on the insulating belt with no foil needed.


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