Tesla Gun

Rob Flickenger made a handheld Tesla coil gun. It's amazing and amazingly dangerous. Don't do this. Live vicariously through Flickenger instead. "The Tesla Gun" (dɸ/dt)

• [Rich Keller]

  Well, alrighty, then. Mr. Flickenger is, indeed, the Mad Scientist that so many of us are merely pretending to be. Although it looks that pretending is much, much safer.

  And in that top photo he looks a bit like Ranxerox. Znort!

• [Bill Beaty]

  Impressive!  And very wise to not build an *actual* Tesla gun, a kilowatt ‘Lenard tube’ device.   Tesla’s version nearly killed an assistant (they didn’t know the beam was dangerous to living things.)   Tesla describes the destruction of flesh, the near fatality, and that the life was saved by …poultices.

• [cjporkchop]

  Am I the only one who thinks that costume is incredibly sexy?

  • [Antinous / Moderator]

    Um, no.

• [MooseDesign]

  I prefer the Tesla-Beaton prototype http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Tesla-Beaton_prototype Glaben.

• [privatedick]

  I read that preceding a Tesla discharge with a laser beam punches an ionized pathway through the atmosphere to the target, which restricts the ‘beam” to the ionized pathway. And there you have it–a true “directed energy” weapon, also known as… a “ray gun”.

  • [Jalek]

    Lasers can be used to induce and direct a discharge from a cloud, so the theory makes sense.
    http://www.sparkingdawn.com/2012/03/controlling-lightning-strikes/

• [Bill Beaty]

  > I read that preceding a Tesla discharge with a laser beam punches an ionized pathway

  Tesla may have had some way of accomplishing this.  Illustrations in his magazine articles depict a sort of “lethal searchlight” destroying aircraft: http://www.teslasociety.com/pictures/war.jpg  But with KM range?  Experts are certain it’s mere exaggeration and fantasy.   But with Tesla, I suspect we never can be certain.  So, did we narrowly escape having WWI fought with deathrays?  :)

• [Michael Smith]

  Maybe Elon Musk is going into the weapons business.