When I first looked at this thread, and it only had a few posts. I didn’t expect it to produce anything all that interesting. Several days went by, and I noticed it had grown to several pages, so I had to see what was being said. I should have realized it had turned into one of those ‘imprecise innovator’ vs. ‘scientific critic’ arguments. Obviously RevSteve was not going to open up to a bunch of people pooh-poohing his work. And simply replying politely to the barbs was just encouraging people to pile on. Since nobody ever changes their mind based on the ‘are not - am too’ method of debate, I decided I would build a Hieronymous machine based on the patent provided in the links. It seemed pretty simple, and reasonable testing could be performed on it.
Clearly, I was not going to invest time, money, and energy in creating an ideal testing environment, but if the machine produced any measurable result, I could decide if was worth further investigation.
I didn’t want the Hieronymous proponents claiming I hadn’t built an actual Hieronymous machine if it didn’t produce results, so I followed the patent schematic and description faithfully. To get as close to the materials used originally as possible, I scrounged through my collection of vacuum tube technology, an RCA console TV and Stereo (1959), a ‘suitcase’ type portable record player (pre - 1960), and a Wurlitzer Jukebox (1949). These Jukebox was as old as the patent, but had the fewest usable parts. The other parts were about 10 years more recent, but that was what I had to work with.
All of the potentiometers were corroded or missing, so I substituted PC mount screw pots that I had in the parts cabinet in Unit 40. For the Prism 28, I had a piece of glass from an old chandalier that had the necessary face angle, slightly less than 60 degrees. I polished the faces on the lap plate I use to fine tune the gibs on my lathe. For the primary receptor Coil 12, I hand wound magnet wire from a transformer in the TV on a 1 inch cardboard tube. Small pieces of ceramic sheet stock that had been sitting in my tool box for ages were used to form the optically opaque passageway 36. No specific material was specified in the patent. The incidence of Electrode 38 to the Prism has to be adjusted to match the atomic weight of the material being tested. I wanted to use mini servos from an RC helicopter to do that so that I could automate the test cycles, but then realized the copper coils in the servos might affect the Radionic reception. Instead I glued a wood dowel at the edge of a cardboard circle, then press fit a copper electrode cut from a welding rod into a slot cut into the exposed end of the dowel. That, and all the components were mounted a 12" square piece of MDF, drilled for mounting holes and wiring. Components were connected with 12AWG wire (guessing, I took it from the record player), with soldered connections.
For test substances I used my 14k gold wedding ring, a 1956 penny (95% copper), and a 1945 Mercury dime (90% silver). Not ideal specimens, but it seemed like enough to get started.
I started by placing the penny about 1 inch away from Coil 12, adjusted the Prism-Electrode incidence according to figure 3, and stroked the Detector 72. Nothing. I carried the Prism-Electrode incidence through its range, still nothing. I began the process of advancing the incidence angle about 5 degrees at a time while adjusting the resistance of Unit 10. Still no results. Changing the capacitance in Unit 16 had no effect either. Even though I felt that the gold and the silver wouldn’t test any better, I tried them out. No change. Just in case the mixed metals in each of the specimens could be problematic, I took one of my wife’s 24k gold earrings, and a backplate from a watch that claimed to be made of silver/zinc alloy, and tested them. You guessed it, nothing.
It isn’t surprising. Problems with the circuit are obvious, even if I don’t have a way to measure Radionic energy. So I decided to make the improvements to the device dictated by standard practices in electronic design.
First, I replaced the variable condensers with modern variable capacitance diodes. Then, it was obvious that Unit 40 was contributing to a harmonic current that would leak through Transformer/Decoupler 58. I added ceramic caps and resistors to ground to the wiring before and after the screw pots to dampen the harmonic. For the prism, I noticed that the patent mentioned glass, but also quartz. Knowing quartz crystals have properties not found in ordinary glass, I took a quick trip to a local shop that had quartz crystals along with other decorative and lifestyle items. They had huge crystals they wanted a fortune for, but they found a smaller one, that had been ground to fit in a display, and it had a 45 degree angle between the faces. The patent had stated that a cylindrical coil for the receptor could be used, but more specifically stated a flat body coil. So I rewound the coil on a removable body, flattened it out, and laquered it down a piece of flat PVC sheet. I put the whole assembly back together, then began taking measurements with the ancient Textronic oscilloscope at each junction. Placing the assembly on top of a metal cart showed less noise than sitting on my Formica topped bench. Holding metal sheets over the top didn’t make any difference in the noise level, which was barely perceptible after recleaning all the solder joints.
I started the testing procedure again. First with the penny, 15 degrees past the incidence angle according to the chart, at about 250k ohms of resistance, I thought I felt something on the Detector. I wasn’t going to go with just that, so I attached the scope leads to the detector and tried again. The scope showed an erratic wave of a few microvolts, typical in any circuit. I wasn’t sure if I felt anything, but increasing the incidence angle about 5 degrees made the line on scope go totally flat, as if not a single microvolt could be detected. I increased resistance with no change in feel, but as I decreased it back down, I felt a definite tingle, and resistance to finger movement on the detector, and the flat line resumed on the scope. Changing the capacitance didn’t work the same way. Unless it I kept the level at the center of the range, about 600 microfarads, nothing else worked.
I put the gold earring in front of the detector, and increased the incidence angle proportionally to the difference in atomic weight between gold and copper. I couldn’t feel anything. I began adjusting the incidence angle, and approaching 90 degrees I felt something at the detector again, and saw the scope line go flat again. I tried the silver watch back next, but could not detect anything across the range of incidence or resistance.
I didn’t know what I was feeling at the detector, or the meaning of the flat line on the scope. So I began examining the circuit again for any unintentional electrical effect I might have induced. Thinking about possible differences between the modern and period components, I remembered hearing long ago that variable potentiometers often produced a logarithmic change in resistance that would have provided a much greater range of resistance adjustment. I had one logarithmic pot, and would have skipped that, but I called the guy down the street who own a TV repair and sales shop if he had any old parts. He laughed when he heard what I was looking for, but told me to come on over. He had parts going back into the 1950’s when his father had opened the business. We managed to find a few potentiometers that measured a somewhat logarithmic output with a multimeter. He laughed again when I told him about the experiment, and I hadn’t even mentioned detecting something with the gold and copper specimens.
I had already wasted a week on this, and my wife was getting annoyed that I hadn’t cleared the clog in the bathroom sink, but I find plumbing to be the least interesting scientific discipline, so I pressed on with the experiment. With the logarithmic pots installed, I could detect the silver as well. With each substance, I carefully adjusted the resistance and Prism/Electrode angle until I obtained the maximum ‘feel’. I marked the adjustment positions and found that the effect dropped off rapidly with any changes in the incidence angle or decreasing the resistance. The effect was more gradual as resistance increased.
These initial tests indicated something, but what was indicated was far from clear. If the there was some electrical effect I couldn’t measure it, except from the flat line on the scope when the device was adjusted within range of each substance. If there was Radionic energy, how would I confirm it? I decided one more test would be necessary. I took the test samples and wrapped each in aluminum foil, and placed them about 10 feet apart from each other and went to bed. The next day I removed them and from the wrapping and tested them one by one, bringing only one specimen near the device at any time. The feeling at the detector was more than simply noticeable. There was a strong resistance to the motion of my finger over the detector, and a clear repulsive force that was keeping my finger from directly contacting the detector.
At this point, I didn’t know what to do. There was obviously some energy being concentrated at the detector, but I had no way to measure it. Now I know how Gallileo, Newton, and RevSteve felt. There was something that I could definitely put my finger on and feel, but how would I ever prove this? I read the patent again, carefully going over the section on operation of the device. I began to pick out the principles that Hieronymous had derived. The receptor Coil was a copper coil. Hieronymous probably didn’t realize it, but due to EMI , there is almost always an electromagnetic flux in the coil. Even in the 1940’s there was plenty of EMI from radio stations, old fashioned car generators, and various electrical device. Though barely perceptible in the EM spectrum, something was emanating from substances at a unique frequency that was aligning with the field created in the coil. This was carried through the wiring to the Stationary Electrode 32, then discharge to be refracted through the Prism. This meant that Radionic energy had characteristics of both electromagnetism and light. I don’t know where I received the insight from, but I realized that if the detector was emanating a force that could be detected by the human finger, it could also be refracted again through a prism. In that way, it might have an effect on light passing through prism.
As quickly as possible, I got another quartz crystal, and attached a photoelectrical sensor used to calibrate CRTs. Placing the crystal prism over the detector, I directed a simple laser pointer into the prism. My heart pounded against my chest as I brought my gold ring close to the Receptor Coil. The measurable light intensity at the photoelectric sensor rose and fell with any change in proximity of the gold ring! Radionic energy could be modulated and converted based on a congruent effects in light and electromagnetism.
If the simple prism converter worked, there were probably other phenomena that could be measured as well. Hours went by as I considered one option after another for converting the Radionic energy directly into electromagnetism. Hours of frustration turned to days. I could not sleep, or eat, or focus on anything else, including the continuing pleas from my wife to fix the bathroom sink. Then in the early in the morning I heard my wife demanding I give her driving instructions for the back way to get to her sister’s place a couple of states away. I didn’t want to think back to the last time I took that route, so I pulled out my cell phone and turned on the GPS. I was surprised to see that the GPS located my current position at point nearly a mile away. Cursing at the phone, I headed up the basement steps so I could get online and look at a map. But at the top of steps, I noticed the GPS now picked up the proper location.
As my wife gaped in amazement, I turned and went back down the steps. As I got to a few feet from the Hieronymous device, the GPS changed my location again. The closer I put the cell phone to the device, the further away the reported location got! The device was clearly affecting all physical phenomena within its vicinity. Suddenly, I don’t know how, a concept popped into my head. I flung odds and ends out of a box until I found an old fiber optic cable for a Novell network. I slit open the cable sheath and extracted a single glass fiber. Taking the same cylinder I had used to make the original Receptor Coil I wound the glass fiber. I inserted the ends into terminators and attached them to the opposing faces of the prism I had placed over the detector. As I moved my gold ring away from and towards the Receptor I thought I saw a barely perceptible violet emanation from the ends of the coil. Turning down the lights, I still felt I noticed something, but again, it was an effect I could not readily measure. I knew intuitively that I was onto something, and taking a stab in the dark, I grabbed a copper welding rod and passed it through the center of the glass fiber coil.
Instantly I felt the tingling in my fingertips that I had felt at the detector. And as I moved the rod back and forth through the coil I felt a definite resistance. I snatched a couple of plastic bottles off the shelf along with some duct tape, and quickly rigged up a structure to support the copper rod in the middle of the glass coil. I hooked the scope leads to the ends of the copper rod, and there was a clear voltage measured. Moving my gold ring relative to the Receptor changed the voltage proportionally. Then I crouched down and looked through the center of the glass fiber coil. The violet glow was readily apparent. I twisted the potentiometer to change the resistance but there was no change in the voltage. Then, realizing I hadn’t tried adjusting the capacitance recently, I turned the dial. There was an immediate visual effect as I looked down the length of the rod. Like a reverse fish-eye lens, everything I could see seemed to collapse towards the center of the coil, and it became darker in the area close to the interior surface of the coil. Continuing to increase capacitance, the effect was enhanced as all light passing through the coil seemed to collapse around the copper rod.
Then as I turned the capacitance up higher, a spark seemed to leap from the coil directly upwards towards a water pipe. There was a blinding flash of blue-violet color, and in an instant I found myself back upstairs, sitting in from of the computer, looking at this thread. The computer claimed it was June 3rd. Moments before it had been June 15th! I ran down to the basement, but there was no sign of the machine I had built, and all the components were back where they came from.
So before I start building another device, I wanted to see if anybody on this board could tell me what happened. What did I do wrong at the end? What could have been happening inside that device? Is there any peer reviewed research into Radionics?
Oh, before I forget, I remember looking at this thread on June 4th and 5th. If I knew this would happen I would have written down your posts. I don’t remember the details, but your comments were hilarious.