Intro: Build a 15,000 rpm Tesla Turbine using hard drive platters
Here's a project that uses some of those dead hard drives you've got lying around. In the Tesla Turbine, air, steam, oil, or any other fluid is injec...
Step 1 should probably be to disassemble some hard drives but I assume that if you read Make, you've already figured out how to un-Make a hard drive.T...
The ideal spacing between the platters depends on several variables including the fluid viscosity, velocity, and temperature. You could go through th...
This is just a piece of aluminum stock turned on a lathe. The center diameter is about .98" (which is the inside diameter of the platters) and about ...
The collars are made from more aluminum stock are wider versions of the platter spacers. The inside diameter is also .98" but they're about .3" thick...
Center the platters, spacers, and collars on the shaft and tighten the set screws to hold everything together. I used 11 platters, and 10 spacers. T...
This is a 4.75" x 4.75" x 2" piece of acrylic that was bored out on a lathe using a 4 jaw chuck. The intake hole is taped for a 1/4" pipe fitting and...
The side panels are 4.75" x 4.75" x 0.47" acrylic with untaped .25" holes to screw to the main chamber. The center hole is 0.6" and the counterbore i...
This is actually correctly designed, with the exhaust escaping through the shaft hole.
The Tesla turbine relies on the boundary layer effect and centrifugal force. The air gets forced to the center and out the shaft hole. An exhaust port on the side would ruin the design of the turbine.
Centrifugal does exist, it depends on your plane of reference. If your plane of reference is the object which has a centripetal force acting on it, there is a centrifugal force.
It's all to do with plane of reference. If you have a rotating plane of reference, you can have a centrifugal force. Look at the Wikipedia article for it.
Bio:I have B.S. degrees in both Physics and Electrical Engineering. I do Lecture Demonstrations for the University of Washington Department of Physics.
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Maybe i missed something...
Thanks for the tuto.
.:FFH:.
This IS a stupidly designed device.
the air actually escapes thru the shaft hole.
The Tesla turbine relies on the boundary layer effect and centrifugal force. The air gets forced to the center and out the shaft hole. An exhaust port on the side would ruin the design of the turbine.
If you have a rotating plane of reference, you can have a centrifugal force. Look at the Wikipedia article for it.