Induction Electrostatic Generators use a pre-existing electrostatic charge to induce electrical charge in other objects. The induced charge can be harvested, re-created, and harvested again and again. The pre-existing charge remains unaffected.

These machines do not "make" electricity in the same way frictional machines do - they take a pre-existing charge and multiply it. As a result, they're crankier and harder to get going - but once they start functioning, they can make a lot of electricity very rapidly. The effect is rather like compound interest in the financial system: use money to make money, use charge to make charge.

It is simplest to classify these machines by the names of their inventors, or by the names their inventors gave them. The machine in the picture to the right is a Toepler-Holtz generator circa 1900 by the Betz company of Chicago. It was intended for medical use, and has an X-Ray tube controller as an integral part.

A2.1 Wimshurst (invented ca. 1880)
A2.2 Toepler, Holtz (invented ca. 1870)
A2.3 Carré, Bertsch
A2.4 others not specifically mentioned - Van de Graaff, Guerin et al

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© The Bakken Updated: April 6, 2007