Experimental Results of Schlicher's Thrusting Antenna

TITLE AND SUBTITLE:
Experimental Results of Schlicher's Thrusting Antenna

AUTHOR(S):
Gustave C. Fralick and Janis M. Niedra

REPORT DATE:
November 2001

FUNDING NUMBERS:
WU-713-74-70-00

PERFORMING ORGANIZATION NAME(S) AND ADDRESS(ES):
National Aeronautics and Space Administration
John H. Glenn Research Center at Lewis Field
Cleveland, Ohio 44135-3191

PERFORMING ORGANIZATION REPORT NUMBER:
E-13058

SPONSORING/MONITORING AGENCY NAME(S) AND ADDRESS(ES):
National Aeronautics and Space Administration
Washington, DC 20546-0001

REPORT TYPE AND DATES COVERED:
Technical Memorandum

SPONSORING/MONITORING AGENCY REPORT NUMBER:
NASA TM-2001-211207
AIAA-2001-3657

SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES:
Prepared for the 37th Joint Propulsion Conference and Exhibit cosponsored by the AIAA, SAE, AIChE, and ASME, Salt Lake City, Utah, July 8-11, 2001. Gustave C. Fralick, NASA Glenn Research Center, and Janis M. Niedra,
QSS Group, Inc., 2000 Aerospace Parkway, Brook Park, Ohio 44142. Responsible person, Gustave C. Fralick, organization code 5510, 216-433-3645.

ABSTRACT:
Experiments were conducted to test the claims by Rex L. Schlicher, et al., (Patent 5,142,861) that a certain antenna geometry produces thrust greatly exceeding radiation reaction, when driven by repetitive, fast rise, and relatively slower decay current pulses. In order to test this hypothesis, the antenna was suspended by strings as a 3 m pendulum. Current pulses were fed to the antenna along the suspension path by a very flexible coaxial line constructed from loudspeaker cable and copper braid sheath. When driving the antenna via this cabling, our pulser was capable of sustaining 1200 A pulses at a rate of 30 per second up to a minute. In this way, bursts of pulses could be delivered in synch with the pendulum period in order to build up any motion. However, when using a laser beam passing through a lens attached to the antenna to amplify linear displacement by a factor of at least 25, no correlated motion of the beam spot could be detected on a distant wall. We conclude, in agreement with the momentum theorem of classical electromagnetic theory, that any thrust produced is far below practically useful levels. Hence, within classical electrodynamics, there is little hope of detecting any low level motion that cannot be explained by interactions with surrounding structural steel and the Earth's magnetic field.

SUBJECT TERMS:
Electromagnetic theory; Propulsion; Maxwell's equations

NUMBER OF PAGES:
12

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