Russian inventors. Lodygin

2024 Author: Seth Attwood | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 15:55

The surprisingly talented Russian inventor, who, among other things, created an incandescent lamp as a by-product to his "electrolyte", was hushed up during his lifetime and is hushed up now. And the scientific and technical thief Edison is considered the inventor of the light bulb …

In one old book, published at the beginning of the twentieth century in Moscow by the publishing house of Mauritius Wolf, in an essay about the great Russian inventor it is written the following: “Lodygin - this surname is hardly known to anyone. And meanwhile, this name is associated with an enormous improvement in the field of electric lighting, which laid the foundation for the widespread distribution of electric light."

Indeed, even in the excellent vocabulary of Brockhaus and Efron one cannot find a word about him. There is one Lodygin - a well-known connoisseur of horse breeding, who developed the genealogy of the trotting breed, but Alexander Nikolaevich, the inventor of the incandescent lamp, much ahead of everyone's known Edison, is not! Newspapers in the States did their best, advertisements did their best, American agility, sparing no big money for the sake of even greater profits - and all the glory, success to Edison. At home, they kept silent about Lodygin, although an official patent document confirming Russian priority existed indisputably.

We do not value our own. Decades after they pass away - then it happens, we wake up. In pursuit, we can lament …

After the triumphant flashes of the "Russian light" that lit up the streets of a number of European capitals, and after the early death of the Russian inventor Yablochkov, exhausted by the struggle for his life, it became clear what the next step would be. It became clear that a certain MAGIC LAMP was about to appear, THAT WILL TURN THE ELECTRIC LIGHTING FROM AN AMAZING, UNUSUAL Phenomenon - INTO A URBAN. Economical, reliable, efficient. But from whom can one expect such a accomplishment, capable of presenting the whole world in a new light - from the American Edison, who has already stunned his contemporaries with a cascade of wonderful inventions, or from the Russians who do their own thing, slowly, but very brightly, in their own way and always - unexpectedly?

Let's digress a little. The inventor Lodygin did not immediately develop. And he did not immediately take up the problem of electric light. He was the same age as Pavel Nikolayevich Yablochkov, and their fates were largely similar. True, Lodygin survived much Yablochkov. But now who has been given something …

Lodygin first invented the electric flight

In September 1870, a curious document was laid on the table of infantry general and cavalier Milyutin, Minister of War of Russia, which should have played a major role in the history of technology, but, nevertheless, remained in vain, since the MINISTER OF INTEREST IN IT DIDN'T DISPLAY. The retired twenty-three-year-old cadet Alexander Nikolaev, son of Lodygin, who served in the Voronezh Cadet Corps as a laboratory assistant in a physics room and an observer of a weather station, as well as an assistant to a blacksmith at the Tula Arms Factory, wrote in a petition: “The experiments carried out by the commission on the use of balloons in military affairs give me the courage to apply to Your Excellency, with a request to draw your attention to the electric plane invented by me - an aeronautical vehicle that can move freely at different heights and in different directions and, serving as a means of transporting goods and people, can at the same time satisfy specially military requirements …"

The minister, as we have already noted, did not pay attention, although for the sake of ONLY CURRENCY I SHOULD CALL THE INVENTOR OF THE ELECTRIC AIRCRAFT. The authorities did not want to familiarize themselves with Lodygin's theory, not to mention the fact that they did not even think to allocate the necessary funds to him to set up a test machine. And he, without wasting time, began to invent an electric lamp, necessary for a night flight. And, judging by the information available, he even managed to conduct some experiments with her.

Without waiting for an answer, Lodygin, with considerable effort, scraped up money for a trip to Paris and. Without at all caring about his wardrobe - as he was in an army jacket, in a shirt outside and boots, he went to a country that is a recognized trendsetter. Not, of course, to dress there in European style, in accordance with the times. And to implement their technical ideas. Since the house could not budge, maybe in France he will be able to achieve at least something … Moreover, the St. Petersburg professor, with whom the young inventor managed to get in touch, having familiarized himself with the calculations and drawings, confirmed their thoroughness and accuracy in theory.

THE LODYGIN'S ELECTRIC FLIGHT AMAZINGLY PREPARED THE IDEA AND THE BASIC DESIGN FEATURES OF THE HELICOPTER. At that time, projects of controlled balloons were already appearing, but the Lodyginskaya machine was the upcoming STAGE OF ENGINEERING THOUGHT and, in fact, had nothing to do with them. It was conceived by the designer in the form of an elongated cylinder, conical in front and spherical at the end behind. The propeller, located in the stern, was supposed to impart movement to the apparatus in the horizontal direction, and the propeller from above, with a vertically standing axis, depending on the angle at which the blades were turned, gave different speeds in both the vertical and horizontal directions. It was not destined for this machine to be embodied in metal - THE RUSSIAN INVENTOR LODYGIN WAS TOO FAR WAY OF HIS TIME …

A light bulb was needed for the electrolyte

There is one truly astounding page in the story of the electric gun. From the idea of electric lighting in a night flight, a creation arose, which was destined to glorify the name of Lodygin. It was the electric lamp, and not the wonderful electrolyte, for the sake of which he was ready for any hardships, that first brought him success, fame, and then, alas, unfair oblivion.

But how did Alexander Lodygin come to his great invention? How did you manage to do what many aspired to? After all, such minds, such talents tried to achieve the same! Maybe chance turned the wheel of luck in his direction and helped to achieve success? An instant flash of guesswork - and everything calmed down, came the solution?

Anything but chance. There were a great many cases, but such that only hindered him. And there was a moment of insight, I guess. Only after all it is necessary to take into account that not everyone is able to evoke in themselves, to experience the illumination of a happily found thought. Solutions.

Already seventy years in the world after the experience of the Russian genius Vasily Vladimirovich Petrov, they knew: if you pass a sufficiently strong current through two closely placed coal rods, connect them, and then separate them, a dazzling light appears between their ends - an electric arc. ARC OF PETROV. It will shine until the electrodes burn out. Petrov immediately understood how important he was able to make a discovery: "… from which the dark calm can be quite illuminated." And he was right. In the main: the arc has found application. But it was not possible to get a reliable source of light from it. Lodygin decided to choose a different path: not an arc lamp will illuminate the world, but an incandescent lamp.

THROUGH EXPERIENCES, ENDLESS EXPERIENCES, ALEXANDER NIKOLAEVICH LODYGIN PROMOTED TO HIS HISTORICAL PURPOSE. Not every conductor was suitable as a source of luminescence. Glow is the result of heating, and when heated, transformations of the substance of the conductor certainly occur - either it burns out, or, as the inventor put it, "chemically decomposes." This means that there is only one way out: to pass current through a conductor in empty space or in nitrogen. Although, of course, you can try to replace nitrogen with some other gas that does not combine with the substance of the conductor.

This is the solution: you need a vacuum or neutral gas in a glass flask, into which a conductor is introduced through the hermetically sealed end.

Lodygin made several lamps according to this principle, and each gave an example of different solutions. The biggest difficulty was that there was no reliable pump that could pump out air to the required degree of rarefaction. In addition, Lodygin was looking for all kinds of sealing methods. In the end, he chose a lamp with an open base submerged in an oil bath. Insulated wires ran through the tub to the carbon rods. There were two of them: as soon as the first burned out, the other was connected. Two and a half hours of continuous light is a victory!

Demonstration of the lamp aroused delight, admiration. PEOPLE WALKED IN CROWDS TO WATCH LODYGIN'S ELECTRIC LIGHT. This was the world's first experience with electric street lighting.

The recognition came. The St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences awards Lodygin the most honorable Lomonosov Prize. In addition to recognition and fame, this is a thousand rubles - a lot of money that can be used for further research. On July 11, 1874, the inventor receives a patent for "Method and Apparatus for Cheap Electric Lighting". A certain Florent, the owner of a fashionable lingerie store in St. Petersburg, installs three Lodygin vacuum tubes in his salon. Engineer Struve proposes to use Lodygin lamps for underwater lighting during caisson work during the construction of the Alexander Bridge.

In Russia, inventors do not compete, but are friends

GLORY ABOUT NEW, UNSEEN RUSSIAN LAMPS HAS BEEN RUNNING ABROAD. In 1873, Lodygin received patents in Austria and Germany. Italy. Portugal. Hungary, Spain and even in such distant countries as Australia, India. In Germany, patents were issued in his name in a number of separate principalities. Privileges were received in the name of the company founded by Lodygin in France. Western newspapers vied with each other to publish messages about a new Russian invention. But neither in Russia itself, nor abroad, did anyone undertake the serial production of Lodyginsky lamps. This is a new business, and who knows where everything can turn … And the other "Russian light" - Yablochkov's candle? Will she prevail? The theaters and shops of Paris, London, and other cities highlighted by her - isn't this the best, most convincing evidence of her capabilities and bright electric future?

And what about Yablochkov himself? They are friends with Lodygin, and Yablochkov, continuing to work on improving his candle, gives public lectures in support of electric lighting, in support of Lodygin, and even gives him the opportunity to experiment at a factory that produces "electric candles" - Yablochkov's arc lamps. And, not holding back, it also falls upon the hasty followers of Lodygin. In a hurry to cash in on his invention, including Edison. On the energetic Edison, who rushed to develop the idea of the Russian engineer Alexander Lodygin without any references. That Edison knew about the new Russian miracle is indisputable.

Is Thomas Edison a Science and Technology Thief?

Only in the spring of 1879, six years after Lodygin, the shameless American puts on his first experiment with an incandescent lamp, and, moreover, an unsuccessful one: the EDISON LAMP EXPLODES. Only thirteen months later, having spent a huge amount of money, Edison comes to success. But Petersburg had already been illuminated by Lodygin's lamp six years earlier!

In the meantime, the INCREDIBILITY is already PERFORMED. Russian newspapers, forgetting about their own admiration for the Lodygin lamp, praise Edison in every way! Lodygin, on the other hand, is not outraged, does not appear either publicly or in print with evidence of his irrefutable priority. Well, he doesn't care? Or, perhaps, he is busy with something and does not consider it possible, necessary to interrupt for words?

Well, of course he's busy. LODYGIN MOVES FURTHER: FROM A LAMP WITH A CHARCOAL THREAD - TO A LAMP WITH A THREAD OF REFRACTORY METALS. She dreams of giving eternity to her lamp. And to people - unfading light. And he creates such a lamp - with a tungsten filament, and the patent for it is bought by one of the world's largest companies - the American General Electric. Let us make a note along the way: NOW THE WORLDWIDE FAMOUS AMERICAN FIRM PURCHASES THE PATENT OF THE RUSSIAN LODYGIN, AND NOT THE AMERICAN EDISON! It is also clear why: with tungsten and molybdenum filament, these lamps, exhibited at the World Exhibition in Paris in 1900, literally eclipsed other achievements of science and technology.

The recognition has come. After death …

Lodygin's fate abandoned. For some time he worked in America as a senior chemist at a battery plant - he had to leave Russia for a while. Apparently, he was somehow connected with the Narodnaya Volya and together with those who managed to escape the arrests - at the end of December 1884, in an obvious haste, he left for Paris. Then he worked on the construction of the New York subway as an electrical lighting engineer, BUILD an ELECTRIC CAR OF OWN DESIGN, made a number of other inventions, and after twenty-three years of absence again set foot on Russian soil.

He brought with him drawings and calculations of several new inventions, including military ones - special alloys for armor plates and projectiles, an electrochemical method for extracting aluminum and lead from ore, a light and strong engine suitable for submarines and aircraft, “air torpedo for attack enemy airplanes, airships and other things (like a rocket). And I didn’t bring any SAVINGS. On the contrary, everything. What was available was wasted. He did not know how, like Edison, to greedily earn money. What is left for him, besides how to look for service … But already sixty … The Electrotechnical Institute offered a course on the design of electrochemical plants, and Lodygin happily agreed.

1910 marked the fortieth anniversary of the incandescent lamp. Now, after living in America, where the successful Edison was glorified at every step, Alexander Nikolaevich's bitterness broke through, resentment for injustice. He wrote in the newspaper Novoye Vremya: "An inventor in Russia is almost a pariah … I know this both from my personal experience and from the experience of many others …"

It's like that. But, it is true, it happens that injustice gives way to recognition. The only pity is that it often comes too late.