Inventing A Complete System Of Lighting - 3

  Inventing A Complete System Of Lighting - 3

 Fourth--To elaborate a system or network of conductors capable of being placed

underground or overhead, which would allow of being tapped at any intervals, so that

service wires could be run from the main conductors in the street into each building.

Where these mains went below the surface of the thoroughfare, as in large cities, there

must be protective conduit or pipe for the copper conductors, and these pipes must allow

of being tapped wherever necessary. With these conductors and pipes must also be

furnished manholes, junction-boxes, con- nections, and a host of varied paraphernalia

insuring perfect general distribution.

Fifth--To devise means for maintaining at all points in an extended area of distribution a

practically even pressure of current, so that all the lamps, wherever located, near or far

away from the central station, should give an equal light at all times, independent of the

number that might be turned on; and safeguarding the lamps against rupture by sudden

and violent fluctuations of current. There must also be means for thus regulating at the

point where the current was generated the quality or pressure of the current throughout

the whole lighting area, with devices for indicating what such pressure might actually be

at various points in the area.

Sixth--To design efficient dynamos, such not being in existence at the time, that would

convert economically the steam-power of high-speed engines into electrical energy,

together with means for connecting and disconnecting them with the exterior

consumption circuits; means for regulating, equalizing their loads, and adjusting the

number of dynamos to be used according to the fluctuating demands on the central

station. Also the arrangement of complete stations with steam and electric apparatus and

auxiliary devices for insuring their efficient and continuous operation.

Seventh--To invent devices that would prevent the current from becoming excessive

upon any conductors, causing fire or other injury; also switches for turning the current on

and off; lamp-holders, fixtures, and the like; also means and methods for establishing the

interior circuits that were to carry current to chandeliers and fixtures in buildings.

Here was the outline of the programme laid down in the autumn of 1878, and pursued

through all its difficulties to definite accomplishment in about eighteen months, some of

the steps being made immediately, others being taken as the art evolved. It is not to be

imagined for one moment that Edison performed all the experiments with his own hands.

The method of working at Menlo Park has already been described in these pages by those

who participated. It would not only have been physically impossible for one man to have

done all this work himself, in view of the time and labor required, and the endless detail;

but most of the apparatus and devices invented or suggested by him as the art took shape

required the handiwork of skilled mechanics and artisans of a high order of ability.

Toward the end of 1879 the laboratory force thus numbered at least one hundred earnest

men. In this respect of collaboration, Edison has always adopted a policy that must in part

be taken to explain his many successes. Some inventors of the greatest ability, dealing

with ideas and conceptions of importance, have found it impossible to organize or even to

tolerate a staff of co-workers, preferring solitary and secret toil, incapable of team work,

or jealous of any intrusion that could possibly bar them from a full and complete claim to

the result when obtained. Edison always stood shoulder to shoulder with his associates,

but no one ever questioned the leadership, nor was it ever in doubt where the inspiration

originated. The real truth is that Edison has always been so ceaselessly fertile of ideas

himself, he has had more than his whole staff could ever do to try them all out; he has

sought co-operation, but no exterior suggestion. As a matter of fact a great many of the

"Edison men" have made notable inventions of their own, with which their names are

imperishably associated; but while they were with Edison it was with his work that they

were and must be busied.