I recently started coming across sites devoted to “lifters”–experimental aircraft that utilize the Biefield-Brown effect to generate lift. (There was even a widely circulated news story recently about some H.S. students in the Midwest who were creating a lifter as a science fair experiment.)
What, exactly, is happening? Detractors say that the lift is the result of an “ionic wind”–whatever the heck that means. Proponents have since conducted lifter flights in lab vacuums, which, they say, proves that “ionic wind” is not a factor.
What does any of this mean? How are these widely replicated devices flying? And what in the world is “ionic wind”?
[Footnote: These things look way cool. If the necessary E.E. experience threshold–and the voltages–were lower, I’d be pulling out the balsa wood and tinfoil to create one myself.]
Sonofabitch! I searched for “biefield”, presuming that it would come up in few other circumstances, and found nothing (even though it’s right there in the first “lifter” result I opened…).
Damn that pathetic search function. Just getting a freakin’ monkey to return random threads would be more useful. No wonder the board traffic’s so bad.
Sigh. Off to read the other threads, then register a complaint at ATMB.
Instead of having all interested parties put a strain on the search engines (the main cause of wear on the hamsters), why doesn’t someone post relevant links like I’m about to?
I have seen several claims that they work in a vacuum as well. What I have not seen is documentation of any kind that this is true. Before I give up on the ion wind effect, I want to see solid documentation of these type devices working in a vacuum chamber.
Also, I want to know just how hard a vacuum the chamber is pumped down to. I would not be surprised to find the lifter works better as the atmospheric pressure was reduced, to a point.