The first alternators. Part 1

The first single-phase synchronous generator

The receipt of an alternating current never presented any fundamental difficulties. Indeed, in the windings of all electric machine generators (except for unipolar), alternating currents are generated, which in DC machines are converted by a collector into a current of constant direction.

In 1832, an anonymous inventor created the first single-phase synchronous multi-pole generator, and all subsequent work in the field of electrical machines was aimed at finding the best designs for switching devices.

Ould's generator

For a long time, the alternating current did not find any practical application, and therefore attempts to design alternators before the end of the 70s were episodic. During this period, alternators were usually DC machines, in which the collector was replaced by two contact rings.

So, in 1863 Wilde developed as an option of a machine with electromagnets an alternator. This generator, instead of a collector consisting of two plates, had two contact rings. The winding of the electromagnets was fed from a separate magnetoelectric generator, mounted on the yoke of the main machine. 4 years later (1867) Wilde built a new alternator, which did not have a separate pathogen.

On the two-T-shaped armature of this generator, two windings were reinforced: the main winding, which through two contact rings gave a current to the external circuit, and an auxiliary one, which fed the winding of electromagnets through a two-plate collector.

The main disadvantage of this machine was the large losses in the steel of electromagnets due to sharp pulsations of the magnetic flux in the cores. These pulsations of the flow were determined by the pulsating nature of the current obtained in the presence of a two-T-shaped armature. The heating of the cores was so great that the machine could not work continuously for any length of time.

The most significant impetus to work in the field of alternating current generators was given by the electric candle of Yablochkov.

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