Gigabit WAN – THE FUTURE IS HERE, DON’T WAIT FOR IT

What is the NBN? To most people, it is just another acronym that we have heard of, but it is stored in the ever expanding acronym section of our brain where we have no real understanding of what a random combination of capitalised letters means. NBN (in this instance), stands for National Broadband Network and it essentially refers to the fibre infrastructure being rolled out across the country that will provide us with supersonic high speed Internet. As you have probably been alerted to, the government is spending a considerable amount of tax payers money to create this network with the aim of bringing us in line with the more advanced countries in the world and ensure we are not left behind in the increasingly important world of IT (Information Technology for those who prefer to deal in whole words).

93% of Australian premises will have access to a fibre broadband connection that can provide Internet connection speeds of up to 1 Gigabit per second (or 1000Mbps). Not bad, considering the maximum speed you can get from an ADSL connection is 24Mbps. This roughly equates to speeds that are 40x faster than what most of us are capable of getting now (it’s worth noting that ADSL connections never hit their maximum speed either). So what impact can this have on us? This isn’t all about loading a web page faster, rather we will have a whole suite of applications become available to us with these increased speeds. Watching movies from the web, watching your favourite overseas TV show or sporting event from a streaming site, making HD video calls to your family and friends, accessing a leading doctor in a particular field who is remote to you, taking online video education courses from an institute in another country and downloading multiple files (legally of course), are all applications that will be improved and that can be carried out simultaneously without the bottleneck.

I just mentioned a key word – bottleneck. Just like when three lanes turn into one when you are driving down the freeway and everything comes to an insanely annoying stop, the same can happen with your Internet. Think of the NBN as a three lane freeway. When the NBN gets to your house, you want that three lane freeway to continue – you don’t want all of your Internet merging into one lane.

Connection to your Fibre (NBN) termination point will be through Ethernet. Therefore, whatever you plug into it needs to be able to facilitate these impressive speeds. This is the job for a Gigabit Ethernet WAN port, commonly found on many routers. As the name suggests, a Gigabit Ethernet port is capable of speeds of up to 1 Gigabit per second (the same as NBN) and a Gigabit Ethernet WAN port is the link between the NBN network and the router that provides Internet access around your house.

NetComm Wireless for example have a range of routers that feature a Gigabit Ethernet WAN port that are designed to connect you to your chosen Internet service today and also future proof you for when the NBN rolls out to your area, whenever that may be.

NetComm’s latest WiFi routers have a Gigabit port that will enable you to connect to NBN’s fibre broadband.

NF2 – Also features concurrent dual band N900 WiFi, 2x USB host ports and Gigabit LAN ports NP805N – Also features WiFi N, 1x USB host port and Gigabit LAN ports

Most of you are probably on ADSL or cable and wondering when you’ll have access to NBN’s broadband service.

Well don’t wait for fibre broadband to enjoy the latest in WiFi technology. NetComm’s range of Gigabit routers allow you to connect to ADSL today and Fibre when you’re ready to connect.

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Smart LTE Prepaid Simcards

Smart Communications made up to 42Mbps download speed for Filipinos with the introduction of the first prepaid LTE(long-term evolution) Service here in the Philippines.

And it has just the same subscription price as the telco's internet packages: 50PHP for 1 day, 299PHP for a week, and 999PHP for a month. these all come with an unlimited Internet Until June 30, 2013.

Smart Bro Unli surf packages, offer 3G Internet connection speed, is priced at 50PHP a day and 200PHP a week. and rather it makes more sense to be with 4G packages if were on a Smart more-than-a-800 LTE coverage areas.

It makes most likely the telco's way of slowly making everyone to get with the 4G bandwagon. PLDT-Smart Public Affairs Group head Ramon Isberto informed us filipinos on the sidelines of Smart Move Party on 11th of April that they will only be carrying LTE Devices in the near Future.

So if you wanna try out LTE but not wanted to subscribe to a postpaid service. dude! this is your chance!. The Sim-Kit will be available for 350PHP and it comes in two variants: 1st is nano and 2nd will be a dual-cut for devices that require micro or regular SIMs. Take note that the Simcards don't have call functions.

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The Hubbard Coil : Too Good to be True

The Hubbard Coil sounded too good to be true. As it turned out there was a little secret component the inventor neglected to share with the press.

This week’s random article about the seemingly magical energy-producing device demonstrated by Alfred M. Hubbard was found in The Monroe Monitor, Sept. 17, 1920:

MYSTERIOUS COIL PROVES SUCCESS

RUNS AUTOMOBILE ON EVERETT STREETS AND BOAT IN SEATTLE LAKE.

May Reach the Farm to Run Labor-Saving Machinery and Solve Ever-Present Labor Problem.

“In consideration of the telephone, wireless, airplanes and other inventions the man who said ‘there ain’t no such animal,’ when he saw a giraffe should have passed on, but in the face of the claims of a new invention by Alfred M. Hubbard, a Seattle boy, engineers and scientists are reviving the ancient phrase and people generally are waiting to be convinced although willing, so willing, to have the invention develop into a fact.”

“What Hubbard claims to have is a coil that takes its power from the air and turns out an electric current that will run lights, motors, automobiles, stoves, anything where power is needed without money and without price once the coil is installed.”

“An ‘atmospheric power generator’ he calls it for want of a better name.”

No Light Bills

“A coil it is, or a series of coils, a central coil surrounded by smaller coils and all wound to form a big coil. No moving parts, no noise, no battery, a little affair about eight or ten inches long. Hubbard connected it up to an ordinary electric light which immediately began to glow and continued to glow and would continue to glow indefinitely– Hubbard claimed.”

“The light demonstration was given last December in the office of one of the Seattle newspapers. Later Hubbard went to Washington, D.C., to arrange for getting a patent. Then he came back and retired into his laboratory to work out a larger coil and the problems of connecting it up to an automobile or a boat.”

“With no particular training for his work except that which every boy who has an inherent curiosity for mechanical things possesses, Hubbard has taken to the study of electricity and the hours that most boys spend in the swimming pool or at other kinds of pool he puts in working with batteries, motors, wireless and his coil. He says he felt that there was a great deal of electric power free in the atmosphere and set out to harness it. He does not think that he has discovered perpetual motion, he makes no such claim, but thinks he has succeeded in transforming the earth’s lines of magnetic force into electrical energy available for use.”

“One thing is certain, he has stumped all of the electrical engineers and scientists, none of whom have been able to offer any possible explanation for what he has done.”

Drives a Launch

“A short time ago Hubbard invited some Seattle people out to the yacht club and took them for a ride in a launch. There was no engine in the launch, only a small motor. With him Hubbard took a coil, larger than the one he used for the light, but not so large that he couldn’t carry it with him. The coil was connected to the motor and the boat started out from the dock. Around the lake it went and then back to the club house. The people with him lifted the coil and looked at it. Then they started on a still hunt around the boat for storage batteries. Then they sat down and stared at each other.”

“Then Hubbard connected the coil to the motor again and the boat made another trip around the lake. The motor was evidently too small for the coil for the wires connecting the two got hot and to be disconnected occasionally and allowed to cool off.”

“After this Hubbard went up to Everett and put one of his coils in an automobile. The auto was a standard car with the engine left out and a motor, ordinary electric motor, in its place. The coil was small enough to go under the hood of the engine. The auto started off up a steep grade on a dirt road. It ran around the Everett streets. People stared and wondered. They are still wondering.”

“These things have been seen and done. What of the future? Will there be no more transmission lines running up and down the streets and country roads? Will all this legislation about power plant sites be for naught? Will each house have its own coil turning out its heat and light, running the sewing machine and vacuum cleaner and coffee percolator and churn and so on? Will large manufacturing establishments have large coils and no bills for coal or oil fuel and no pall of smoke coming in from their chimneys to burden the atmosphere?”

“Those are questions that are bothering the brains of those who have seen the coil work. What will be the price of copper if every one is trying to buy a coil at once? What about gasoline? Will John D. have a world organization on his hands for which he has no use? Will the coil bring cheap power to the farmer with running water pumped from the well to the barn and the house and for irrigation? Will it be cheaper to pump the rivers here and there than to build long irrigation ditches?”

Years later Hubbard confessed the true source of the energy for his coil. When another inventor produced a similar coil, the young scientist stepped forward and talked to The Seattle Post-Intelligencer. This is quoted from the Feb. 26, 1928 issue:

“In 1919 Hubbard represented the apparatus as being capable of extracting electrical energy directly from the air, but he admitted yesterday that this had been merely a subterfuge to protect his patent rights, and that, as a matter of fact, it had been a device for extracting electrical energy from radium, by means of a series of transformers which stepped up the rays. “

“He declined to go into detail in regard to the exact manner in which he managed to extract power from radium …”

Basically, he produced a sort of nuclear power battery. To this day the exact material he used is not known.

Hubbard’s subsequent career was one wild ride through the shadows. He sold most of the patent rights of his coil to the Radium Chemical Company. In 1929 he took out a patent for radioactive spark plugs, which were actually available on the market from Firestone in the early 1940s.

Hubbard’s path led to running booze in Seattle, which landed him an 18-month prison term. His scientific skills caught the eye of the Office of Strategic Services, and he became a government agent. He somehow became involved with gun-running which attracted the attention of Congress. In order to escape prosecution, he cooled off in Vancouver, B.C. for a few years.

In Canada he created a charter boat service and was a director for a uranium corporation. He became a millionaire but grew bored. In 1951 he discovered LSD and then dubbed himself “The Johnny Appleseed of Acid.” As would be expected, Hubbard’s exact role with any U.S. or Canadian government project is difficult to verify after 1951. When the crazy spiral stopped he was broke and living in a trailer park in Casa Grande, Arizona, definitely not a situation for him that was too good to be true. He died there Aug. 31, 1982.

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The Hubbard Energy Transformer

by Gaston Burridge

Fate Magazine, July, 1956, pp. 36-42

One of the interesting experiments made with the Hubbard transformer was the propelling of a 18 feet boat around the Portage Bay near Seattle.

A 35 horse power electric motor was hooked up to a Hubbard transformer measuring maybe 12- 14 inches in diameter and 14 inches in length. It furnished enough energy to drive the boat and a pilot at a good clip around the bay.

The demonstration lasted several hours and created a sensation. The test required enough current for a long enough time to rule out any sort of battery, being housed in the device.

The voltage could be … 220 volts. It seems unlikely a 35 horsepower motor would have as a low voltage of 110 volts.

Soon after the demonstration, Hubbard’s name dropped from the Seattle paper and he went to work for the Radium Chemical Company of Pittsburgh — now of New York.

According to Hubbard’s statement in the newspaper he sold a 50% interest in his device to the Radium Chemical Company and went to Pittsburgh to continue developing the device for them.

Hubbard related that the company had demanded more and more equity in the machine until finally he retained only a 25% interest. Evidently pressure was bought upon him to sign over an additional 5%.

This Hubbard refused to do, and in 1922 he severed connection with Radium Chemical Company and returned to Seattle.

At the present time Hubbard is not inclined to discuss his employment period with the Radium Chemical Company nor will he discuss this device or his experiences with it.

My first letter to the Radium Chemical Company was not answered. A second letter a few months later brought a reply from Mr. Grange Taylor, vice president of the concern.

He stated that none of the employees presently with the company and also with it in the early 1920′s could remember anything about the device or about Hubbard himself. Mr. Taylor letter said “there is no information available on the device you mention.”

Circulating the central tube and its appendages are eight coils of wire wound upon what appears to be eight cores of magnetic upon iron. These eight coils stand parallel to the central tube. Their outer windings appear to be connected in series and probably form something corresponding to the secondary of the transformer.

As there seems to be more windings on this secondary than the primary one would suspect following ordinary electrical practice. That the transformer was a step up variety rather than a step down.

That is the secondary voltage would be higher than its primary voltage and consequently its amperage would be less.

Four leads out wires are showing. How they are connected together — if they are remains a secret.

Around the outside of the windings appears to be a wrapping of some dense material, probably meant to shield or turn aside the rays from the radio active materials within. Such a shield would be necessary so to protect those working with the apparatus.

All of this is set between the roll ends that make the device look like a giant spool.

There are no moving parts. The machine operates silently.

As far as can be determined no US patents ever were issued to Hubbard’s covering the device.

The Radium Chemical Company list of patents is long but no title in their list appears to cover such an apparatus as Hubbard’s.

Either the device was not developed to a point where a patent could be obtained or because of seeming friction which developed between the company and Hubbard it was impossible for either to obtain a patent.

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Understanding A Single Phase Induction Motors

In order for an induction motor to operate, we need to have a rotor with a short circuited winding inside a stator with a rotating magnetic field.

The flux from the rotating field cuts through the rotor winding and induces a current to flow. The frequency of the current flowing is equal to the difference between the rotational speed of the stator field and the rotor.

The rotor current causes a rotor magnetic field which is spinning relative to the rotor at the rotor current frequency and relative to the stator, at the same frequency as the stator field. The interaction between these two magnetic fields generates the torque in the rotor. There must always be a small difference in speed between the stator field and the rotor in order to induce a current flow in the rotor. This difference in speed or frequency is known as the slip. If we take a stator with a single winding, and apply a single phase voltage to it, we will have an alternating current flowing and thereby an alternating magnetic field at each pole.

Unfortunately, this does not result in a rotating magnetic field, rather it results in two equal rotating fields, one in the forward direction and one in the reverse direction. If we have a short circuited rotor within the stator, it will carry rotor current induced by the stator field, but there will be two equal and counter rotating torque fields. This will cause the rotor to vibrate but not to rotate. In order to rotate, there must be a resultant torque field rotating in one direction only. In the case of the single winding and a stationary rotor, the resultant torque field is stationary.

If we now add a second stator winding, physically displaced from the first winding, and apply a voltage equally displaced in phase, we will provide a second set of counter rotating magnetic fields and the net result is a single rotating field in one direction. If we reverse the phase shift of the voltage applied to the second winding, the resultant magnetic field will rotate in the reverse direction.

Once the rotor is up to full speed, it will continue to run with the second winding disconnected. This is because the rotor circuit is both resistive and inductive. If we consider the magnetic field rotating in the same direction as the rotor, the frequency of the current will be low, so the rotor current will be primarily limited by the rotor resistance. In the case of the counter rotating field, the frequency of the induced current will be almost twice line frequency and so the inductance of the rotor will play a much greater role in limiting the rotor current. In other words, once the motor is up to speed, it will lock on to one field only and the second winding can be disconnected. If the second winding remains in circuit, the displaced field reduces the magnetic fluctuations in the gap and therefore provides a more even torque and less vibration. Some "start" windings are only designed for intermittent operation and they must be disconnected at the end of the start. Continuous operation using these windings would cause a winding failure. Most single phase motors are fitted with a centrifugal switch to disconnect the start winding once the motor is close to full speed.

1. Capacitor Start

This configuration comprises two windings W1 and W2, a centrifugal switch SW1 and a capacitor.

The two windings are wound with a geometric offset, effectively making a second set of poles phase shifted within the stator. The capacitor provides a phase shift to the current flowing in W1 and we therefore have a "two phase" motor while the switch is closed. When the motor is almost up to speed, the switch opens disconnecting W1 and the capacitor. The motor can be reversed by reversing the connections of either W1 or W2 (but not both!)

The start winding (W1) and the start capacitor provide for a rotating magnetic field in one direction enabling the motor to start.

2. Capacitor Start Capacitor Run

This configuration comprises two windings W1 and W2, a centrifugal switch SW1 and two capacitors C1 and C2.

The two windings are wound with a geometric offset, effectively making a second set of poles phase shifted within the stator. The capacitors provide a phase shift to the current flowing in W1 and we therefore have a "two phase" motor. When the motor is almost up to speed, the switch opens disconnecting the capacitor C1. C2 remains in circuit to provide a continued second phase, reducing torque pulsations and noise. The motor can be reversed by reversing the connections of either W1 or W2 (but not both!)

The start winding (W1) and the capacitors provide for a rotating magnetic field in one direction enabling the motor to start.

3. Capacitor Start/Run

This configuration comprises two windings W1 and W2 and a capacitor C1.

The two windings are wound with a geometric offset, effectively making a second set of poles phase shifted within the stator. The capacitor provides a phase shift to the current flowing in W1 and we therefore have a "two phase" motor. C1 remains in circuit to provide a continued second phase, reducing torque pulsations and noise. The motor can be reversed by reversing the connections of either W1 or W2 (but not both!)

The start winding (W1) and the capacitor provide for a rotating magnetic field in one direction enabling the motor to start.

4. Capacitor Star/Run

This configuration comprises two windings W1 and W2 and a capacitor C1.

The two windings are wound with a geometric offset, effectively making a second set of poles phase shifted within the stator. The capacitor provides a phase shift to the current flowing in W1 and we therefore have a "two phase" motor. C1 remains in circuit to provide a continued second phase, reducing torque pulsations and noise. The motor can be reversed by reversing the connections of either W1 or W2 (but not both!)

The start winding (W1) and the capacitor provide for a rotating magnetic field in one direction enabling the motor to start.

5. Induction Start (Split Phase)

This configuration comprises two windings W1 and W2 and a centrifugal switch SW1.

The two windings are wound with a geometric offset, effectively making a second set of poles phase shifted within the stator. The winding W1 has resistance to provide a phase shift to the current flowing in W1 and we therefore have a "two phase" motor while the switch is closed. The motor can be reversed by reversing the connections of either W1 or W2 (but not both!)

The start winding (W1) provides for a rotating magnetic field in one direction enabling the motor to start.

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