Talk:Electrodynamic tether

message: Dudes, current flow requires a closed circuit. Open systems theory has nothing to do with it. Current flows from one end of the tether, through the surrounding environment, to the other end of the tether, down through the tether back to the start point. That's a closed circuit, not an open circuit. Please don't revert unless you can explain it here. Rpresser 16:52, 11 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Sir, current flow requires a circuit. Open systems theory has everything to do with it. Current flows from one end of the tether (the circuit), through the surrounding environment (not the electronic circuit), and back to the tether. That's a open circuit, not closed circuit (just of electronic elements). J. D. Redding 17:16, 11 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Just let me state that a different phrase may be needed. Although a voltage will build up between the ends of a conducting tether, no current will flow unless the "circuit is completed" [between the environment and the tether]. I understand that many times "closed circuit" means that there is a "full path" and "open circuit" means "not a full path" ... but this is not what is meant by the text, it means that there is "interaction in the outside environment (the plasma mediums of space) the electronic circuit proper (the tether)" [aka., an open system]. J. D. Redding 17:43, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

text: Your point is of terminology, not concepts. "Open" electrical circuits that use the environment is well know to knowledgeable electricians. 204.56.7.1 14:51, 12 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  "Closed" vs "Open" circuit 

message: This section really needs to be rewritten. In its previous incarnation it made references to the magnetic field rotating with the Earth, but electromagnetic theory admits of no such rotation. I've removed those references, but the result is hardly an improvement in terms of understandability.
The movement of charges in a conducting tether can be explained either as a lorentz force acting on those charges when they are  moving relative to some observer in a magnetic field, or alternatively as a response to the electric field that exists as a result of a lorentz transformation from the frame of that observer to the frame of the charges. To avoid the complication of the observer also seeing an electric field, we need to make the observer stationary relative to the axis about which the currents in the Earth's core are flowing. Since that axis presumably at least roughly intersects the Earth's axis of rotation, we can conveniently make the observer stationary relative to the centre of the Earth. Such an observer sees only a magnetic field (leaving aside a residual electric field that results from separation of charges in the Earth's core as they move in the magnetic field that they are creating). The velocity used both in calculating both the lorentz force on the charges in the tether, and the lorentz transformation into the frame of the tether, is the orbital velocity relative to the stationary observer.
Now, all of that could go into the article, but it would really be obscuring the main focus of the article. The problem I'm having is how to explain the charge displacement, and possible resulting current, in a way that is physically valid and doesn't lead to flawed  notions about eletromagnetism, but doesn't drown the reader in a morass of detail that they're probably not interested in.
Sylvia 22:22, 6 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Voltage and current 

message: Unintelligible. Scrap the whole thing and start over. So disgusted with this so-called encyclopedia.
::In contrast I found this to be one of the best articles written in all of Wikipedia. It goes from general principles well understand by anyone with a reasonable k-12 education and then get's into details rarely found on Wikipedia. I loved it. Good job authors! War (talk) 17:31, 10 December 2016 (UTC)
thread_title: worse than useless

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thread_title:  External links modified 

message: Under the 'Electrodynamic tether fundamentals' section : '(Assuming a standard east to west orbit around Earth)' - Maybe I'm missing something here, but isn't a standard orbit west to east?  — Preceding unsigned comment added by Sam Pender (talk • contribs) 05:34, 15 July 2018 (UTC)
thread_title:  Assuming a standard east to west orbit around Earth?