HISTORY • Spe • Inventing the 20th Century

by George Colpitts

he last years of the 19th century an engineer, initiator of dozens of cor­ known as "that Sperry boy." But by the began the golden age of the porations, including the Sperry-Rand time he was a farmhand adolescent, his Telectronics hobbyist. Henry, corporation, and the dreamer behind mechanical aptitude and avid reading Foucault and Ohm might have modem avionics, gyro- and joined together in a mind that in­ previously fine-tuned principles of truly closed-looped systems. novated, it seems, without coaxing. electricity and physics, but it was back­ With little education apart from the At 19, Sperry perfected the closed­ yard tinkerers such as Edison, Weston reading of 19th Century Scientific loop, or self-regulating . A few and Siemens who hammered such years later he was perfecting mining principles into every-day life. Often machinery, developing street cars at odds with academic scientists, which· impressed the world, and wild-haired inventors and armchair delving into electro-chemistry. In science buffs experimented with the the 1890s, he patented a storage bat­ internal combustible engine for tery which drove an electrical car 87 cars, dangled from unstable miles (other batteries at the time dirigibles or killed themselves in charged for 30iniles at most). The elaborate airplanes. Store Sperry , the searchlight catalogues and patent monthlies which lit up skies laden with World were crowded with contraptions War One Zeppelins, the gyro-com­ reflecting the come-hell-or-high­ pass, the automatic ship stabilizer, water determination of their and the automatic pilot for aircraft creators. "Invention is 95 per cent eventually became his children. perspiration," Edison had said, And children they were. Sperry's probably without exaggeration and ideas were borne on paper with pen­ most innovation amassed man­ cil; his ability to visualize and draw hours which would make modem concepts, systems and electrical R&D groups cringe. But the years theory was so complete he was able were exciting. These hobbyists until his death in 1930, to pass pages eventually created, patented and ElmerAmbrose Sperry of diagrams and sketches to en- sold modem convenience, the degree gineers · sufficient to initiate yet American magazines . and patent jour­ of which we have never been able to another Sperry product. More than nals, Sperry began his career as inven­ fully match. visualized, most of his 400 patented in­ tor in home-State New York. As a boy Any look at early innovators would ventions gained personalities in the he had set his veranda on fire ex­ have to include inventor-extraordin­ perimenting with benzine vapours, in­ Sperry mind. He described them as "he" naire, , whose or "that brute" or "that fellow." jured a playmate with a homemade hands produced gadgetry which Although he grasped blueprint in­ glass-blowing outfit and was generally changed the planet. He was lionized as tricacies, Sperry was a slow reader, and

8 • Feb/March 1991 Electronics & Technology Today •. ': ..:.:,-' j.' ~~ .)'~ ~·)·~· ... ,,~:-:-· . A ' ' >/ Movement in "error" ac· . lh;;· ··' . Ln·a.de- -- I~-+ "to ., . .S.Ur.llJ·))(Oiol· Uieijht· ~t-JZ,68olbs ' tivated a servomechanism UroJdds ~iz~ J:.st ott-~. '"!'~;;:....•• ·,·· . ") 1 ~ll DTl {Jra,w bJLl"~500 l!,. that rotated the brushes Of the generator until the out- put matched the desired current. When Zula turned the switch, saying playfully, "let there be light," the twenty lights suspended on a ring burst 40,000 candles of light as far as Michigan City, 60 miles distant. streetcar conduc­ tors and drivers reported that all viaducts in the city were well lit, and light reached city limits. "The atmosphere was very luminous," said The Sperry streetcar at the Chicago World's Fair, 1893. Elmer Sperry, right, has his handon the brake. Chicago Tribune, "and as far away as Douglas Park friends who had to read silent movie created previously but had limitations houses cast shadows from the light .... " subtitles aloud to Sperry, were relieved f~r lighting public places. For Sperry, the closed-loop design when talkies were produced. A Over the previous two years, Sperry for the arc lamp carried into most of his notorious speller,. he wrote in a had been attacking the two major weak­ other inventions. By 1893, he was notebook, "Hydrochloric acid out of nesses in arc lighting. First, he had demonstrating a superior hill-climbing salt by electroleciss." He lived in fear of designed a generator that produced a street car at the Chicago World's Fair his teacher's warnings that a poor constant current despite variations in with a developed power transmission, speller, "might be able to ·attain the dig­ the speed of the steam engine driving it. electric brake and related controller. nity of a grocer's clerk ... but nothing Second, Sperry had developed automat­ The electric brake was interesting. In­ more." "Now that I have lived it down," ic regulation of that generator to supply stead of using an electromagnet to pull he said later, "I can see that the whole constant current despite load variations the brake shoe against the braking sur­ world does not revolve around spell­ - especially when arc lights were cut face of the wheel, he designed an an­ ing." out of a circuit. nular electromagnet concentric with the Sperry's world revolved around tech­ Sperry was really beginning present­ nology. Yes, he became a proficient day cybernetics, and even speaker, polished public figure, and though closed-looped writer of passionate poetry to his wife, systems have always but Sperry was most comfortable in the been attractive to iritricacies of electricity and engineer­ electronic and mechanic WIRELESS GUITAR ing. As biographer Thomas Hughes buffs, few up to Sperry said, "Sperry expressed himself in tech­ had been able to develop TRANSMISSION SYSTEM nology." so complete self-regulat­ Sperry's first chance to express him­ ing mechanisms. self came on New Year's Eve in Sperry's arc lamp car­ Chicago, 1885, having laboured for ried "error signal" intel­ weeks installing what he termed the ligence. Within the gen­ greatest concentration of light in the erator, an adjustable world- bundled arc lamps -atop the spring was set for the 300-foot tower of the Chicago Board of desired current and an Trade building. Waiting at the lighting electromagnet with a BUILD YOUR OWN switch was heart throb and future wife movable armature repre­ FOR UNDER $100 Zula Goodman. sented the actual current. COMPLETE PLANS AND DOUBLE SIDED/PLATED THRU-HOLE PCB On the whole, Chicago was dimly lit. The force of · the FOR ONLY $14.95 (PST extra) ' Gas lighting flickered down its streets electromagnet tended to SEND CHEQUE OR MONEY ORDER TO: but only barely lighting sidewalks. move the armature in one RadioActive Transmissions 45 Bramalea Ad, Box 131 Edison's high-resistance, carbon-fila­ direction and the tension Brampton, Ontario L6T 2W4 ment incandescent bulb had been of the spring, attached to the armature, in the other. Circle Reader Service Card No.55

Electronics & Technology Today Feb/March 1991 • 9 axle of the wheel, but attached to the frame of the vehicle. Street car innovations naturally lent itself to the still-developing automobile design. Sperry's fingers were on almost every form of technology rapidly form­ ing, the "horsel~ss carriage" being no exception. Automobiles were being developed in Europe and North America along two philosophies. The internal combustion design, broadly patented by George Baldwin Selden, hiccuped a lot of smoke and noise. The more expensive alternative, which Sperry's "six electrics" were built around, relied on ' electricity. Sperry had unwavering faith in electricity. He had a gasoline vehicle at The Sperryfl171UI)~ about 1910. Standing: (L. toRt.) Lawrence. Elmer, Jr., Helen. one time, "a thing of beauty with two Seated: Elmer Sperry, Edward, Zula. cylinders, steered by a tiller, upholstered in English Wilton and The other problem Sperry addressed gular motion in a plane at right angles to trimmed with aluminum." But the car was stability. Tum-of-the-century the upsetting force, was central to al­ r------.....:.------, vehicles tended to most all Sperry's application of the flip easily. Sperry's gyro. And these applications soon own son, Elmer, Jr. changed the nature of shipping and L>w l'.l;un(L~ ro_ ·.,h t '. ~ rr-alut C?' ~~-.~ )lo! - tilttr.~ !on~!. narrowly escaped aviation. injury when he was Sperry's life-long fascination with thrown from a car the gyro was not unique to the Victorian and Sperry saw the mindset. The forces at work within a most pressing spinning gyroscope were as full of concern was to sta­ promise- and elusive to control - as bilize the vehicle, 20th century theories of fusion energy. and he turned, as he From the 1880s onwards, dozens of did throughout his hackers had filed gyro application life, to the gyro- patents and few of them worked. scope. In the early 1900s Sperry brought From The Sperry Gyroscope Co., "The Sperry Ship Stabilizer" Sperry had ap­ home a gyroscope top for his sons to proached ' Barnum play with but confessed that he hogged was destroyed in a workshop fire, and and Bailey with his first gyro-inven­ most of its use. Through their growing seeing the wreckage Sperry said to his tion: the "wonderful trained wheel-bar- up years, his sons were deluged with sons, "that's what you get for deserting row," a wheelbarrow .------....;_------, electricity." concealing a gyro that Of course, Sperry approached his car allowed tightrope design from different angles. He ap­ walkers to hop in and plied for auto patents for air-cooling the around it without motor, a control system, power-trans­ losing their balance. mission gearing, clutch and brakes. But But Sperry had seen primarily, he attempted to better the applicable battery power. Sperry's battery con­ to almost every major tained diaphragms, or separators - technology, his car in­ fibre composition placed between the cluded. plates carrying the peroxide which kept By mounting a the plates wet with acid. At the same precessing gyroscope 17teCurtissjlyingboaJ.11teSperrystabili.zerof1914was time, the separations kept the plates in the bed of his car, installed on a similaraircrqft. from losing their peroxide, warping, or Sperry calculated that coming into contact with each other. a 200 pound wheel could develop more gyroscope toys and Sperry accumulated The "Sperry Grid" eventually became than four tons of resistance to a tilting a library on the subject. By 1910 he popular batteries for streetcars, force. Sperry's contribution to emerg­ envisioned a gyro with two or three electrics, lights and power stations. ing automobile designs was limited. degrees of freedom serving to stabilize But precessing, or the capability of an- rough-riding cars, rolling boats and out-

10 • Feb/March 1991 Electronics & Technology Today AVAILABLE IN CANADA

HEATHKIT™ PRODUCTS The quality products you have known and Speny examining the repeater compassfor hisgyrocompass installation trusted for over aboard the I!rin~Ann~ 1911. 40 YEARS! of-control airplanes, or guiding them as gyro to the bottom of Stanley Beach's NOW! You Can Learn a oompass by pointing to the axis of the airplane in 1907, failed. But in 1912, by . The eventual development of the then working with his son Lawrence, Beginning to advanced Sperry gyro-, the "Metal Mike' and teaming up with intrepid pilot electronics at home, (an automatic helmsman for large Glenn Curtiss, Sperry developed an ef­ with the same courses steamers) and stabilizers and fective automatic stabilizer before used today in the mechanisms for aircraft eventually World War I which transformed during world's top colleges & grew froin his living room musings. the war into a major component of. an tech schools. Sperry's gyro~compass was actually automatically controlled missile. This successfully test mounted on the U.S.S. would be converted into an automatic And Pay'A Lot Less! Delaware in 1911, installed in a crude pilot after the war. square frame "set up on pipe legs." Lawrence must have been fascinated Sperry's gyro technology soon became with his father's affiliation with speed­ You Receive ! central to seafaring. Boats and sub­ demon Curtiss, especially in light of the marines relied on the compass for direc­ boy's love for aviation. In the summer • DC Electronics tion, and they relied on Sperry stabi-· 1910, when his family was away, • AC Electronics lizers to lesson stomach-churning roll­ Lawrence changed the Sperry home ing on the high seas. into an aircraft factory. He used attic, • Semi Conductors The most fascinating gyro applica­ cellar and bedrooms as work rooms and • Electronic Circuits tion took place in aviation, however. fired the furnace (drained for the sum­ Perhaps stabilization was a luxury in mer) to speed up the dope drying on the • ET 3600 Trainer other areas, but in aviation, especially wing fabric. When the family returned, Software in the precarious Wright designs, · Lawrence displayed the airplane in the REG. $678.45 stabilization, or lack thereof, was the backyard. But inside, the family found greatest challenge after flight was final­ the front hall bannisters had been tom ly attained. out, that a wall had been demolished to The Wright design placed the onus roll the plane into the backyard and the NOW ONLY on the pilot to control all factors affect­ furnace had cracked. Lawrence even­ ing his craft. Once airborne, the pilot tually became a capable pilot, but died $499.95 pushed petals and swung levers - al­ when his plane crashed in a channel + G.S.T. Shipping & Handling most frantically-to maintain stability. crossing to France in 1924. Not only did a flight require awesome By 1914, Sperry created the gyro Call 1-800-66THINK coordination, but stamina. design which still endures in missile 1-800-6.68·-4465 Sperry's first experiments with aircraft stabilization, fixing a passive THINK see Sperry, page 17 ELECTRONICS~ C3C 3140_Grandmarais Rd. E. lS:&2J Windsor, Ont. N8W 4W5

Electronics & Technology Today Circle Reader Service Card No.56 the· cord instead of through you. I also Sperry, cont'dfrompage 11 June, 1914, after a public demonstra­ scrounged a toggle switch which hap­ tion of the stabilizer in Paris. And al­ pened to have leads instead of terminals guidance systems, long-range aircraft though needing refinement, his stabi­ which was good because I could con­ and submarines. Instead of mounting lizer had, indeed, made the skies more nect to the line cord using small Marr two stabilizers separately, as he had friendly. connectors and not have an exposed hot earlier, he nested four gyros on a single Increased research and the produc­ wire inside the chassis. I mounted the platform. The gyros established a tion of dozens of inventions made switch on the rear panel of the box so stable reference and servos aligned the Sperry a corporate head. But one that AC would not have to be run to the airplane with the reference. suspects most of Sperry's dress shirts front and back to the transformer. Sperry used a combination of still carried the odd drop of grease or Remember, if you build this project: BE electrical, mechanical and pneumatic smell of solder. Like most hobbyists, CAREFUL. Always unplug the .t\C components to align the airplane auto­ Sperry's mind never ceased to whir line cord when working inside the chas­ matically with the horizontal stable with innovation. New Yorker sis. If you are troubleshooting the platform. When the airplane went into Magazine profiled Sperry shortly power supply use one hand only when­ an error state- when it deviated from before his death in 1930. Ill and or­ ever possible to minimize the pos­ the horizon -the relative movement dered by his doctor to stay away from sibility of getting ashock. between the stabilized platform and machine shops for health reasons, he The fuse holder I used was a small .the airplane initiated a command sig­ nevertheless penned gizmos which he clip type which was also mounted on nal that operated the servomotors, sent to his engineers. He also added, the rear panel. This type of fuse holder which moved the airplane's control whenever inspiration hit him, to an is not as safe as I would have liked it to surfaces. "ever-present notebook" -No. 78 by be as the contacts are exposed and volt­ The stabilizer also had control sur­ the time of the article. Hours before he age is present if the on/off switch is on. faces so that the airplane would not died after complications from an The alternative is to use a cylindrical pass beyond the horizontal in its operation on June 16, he was still in­ fuse holder which allows external ac­ response. venting. Sperry placed ice before an cess from the rear panel and can be "Sperrys have made aeroplanes electric fan to create a cooler breeze more easily insulated with heat shrink­ safe," reported in beside his hospital bed. 0 able tubing. The one I used just hap­ pened to be available. (I was also con­ the box to make use of the metal box as cerned that the other kind might take up a heatsink. Leads were run from it back AMAZING an objectionable amount of room.) to the circuit board. It is important to After mounting the power trans­ SCIENTIFIC & ELECTRONIC. know that the metal tab on the regulator PRODUCTS former in the rear of the box using pop is connected to the output pin of the rivets I proceed to drill all the holes for device so it had to be isolated from the LASERS AND SCIENTIFIC DEVICES the adjustment pot, LED · and banana VRL2K 3mw Vis Red laser Diode System Kit ...... $159.50 metal box using a mica insulator and a LLIS1k laser Beam"Bounce " listener Kit ...... $199.50 jacks. The banana jacks should be 2 em special isolating washer for the LHC2K Visible Simulated 3 Color laser Kit ...... $44 .50 apart. LC7 40 Watt Burning Cuning laser Plans ...... $20.00 machine screw which fastened it to the RUB4 Hi Powered Pulsed Drilling laser Plans ...... $20 .00 The circuit board is made out of a LGU40 1 to 2mw HeNe Vis Red laser Gun Assembled ...... $199 .00 box. White heat sink compound was llS1 laser lite Show- 3 Methods Plans ...... $20 .00 product called Veroboard. Generic ver­ used to maximize the heat transfer from SD5K See in the Dart< Kit ...... $299 .50 sions are available at parts supply EML1K Electromagnetic Coil Gun Kit ...... $69.50 the device to the box. MCP1 Hi Velocity Coil Gun Plans ...... $15.00 houses. This is a phenolic printed cir­ lEV1 levitating Device Plans ...... $10 .00 Because the meter movement was EH1 Eleclronic Hypnotism Techniques Plans ...... $10 .00 cuit board with copper strips on one something of an afterthought I had to HIGH VOLTAGE AND PWMA DISPLAY DEVICES side. It is predrilled on .25 em centres so HVM7K 75 .000 Volt DC Variable Output Lab Souroe Kit ...... $149 .50 cut a notch out of the circuit board to IOG3K ton Ray Gun 'h , project energy without wires ...... $69 .50 that you can insert . component leads NIG9K 12V/tt 5 VAC Hi Out Neg I on Generator Kit ...... $34 .50 accommodate the rear of the meter EMA1K Telekinetic Enhancer/Hectric Man Assembled ...... $99 .50 through the board, solder them and have movement. I used a nibbler tool for this LG5K lightning Display Globe Kit ...... $54 .50 them connected to any other component BTC1 K Worlds Smallest Testa Coil Kit ...... •.... $49 .50 as well as to cut out the hole in the front BTC3K 250KV Table Top Tesla Coil Kit ...... $149 .50 soldered to that strip. See Figure 5. If BTC5 1.5 Million Volts Testa Coil Plans ...... $20.00 panel for the meter movement. To JL3 Jacobs Ladder- 3 Models Plans ...... $15 .00 you want to isolate one part of a strip mount the circuit board I used 2 em GRA1 Anti Gravity Generator Plans ...... $10 .00 from another it is a simple procedure to PFS20 Plasma Fire Saber Assembled ...... $69 .50 standoff hardware making sure that the 0Pl20 Dancing Plasma to Music and Sounds Assembled .. ... $79 .50 cut the copper using a knife or to use a metal standoffs did not short out any of SECURITY ANO PROTECTION DEVICES drill bit to cut the track around the ITM10 100 ,000 Volt lntimillator up to 10' Assembled ...... St29.50 the copper strips which were being IPG70 Invisible Pain Field Blast Wave Gen Assembled ...... $74 .50 holes. In my version I mounted the PSP4K Phasor Sonic Blast Wave Pistol Kit ...... $59 .50 used. LIST10 Infinity Xmtr. listen in Via Phone Assembled ...... $199 .50 components on one side of the board so Well, there it is. When you are just TAT30 Automatic Tel Recording Device Assembled ...... $24 .50 that I could add circuitry later if I VWPM7K 3 Mi . FM Auto Tel Transmitter Kit ...... $49 .50 starting out on a project like this you FMV1 K 3 Mi. FM Voice Transmitter Kit ...... $39 .50 wished. See Figure 6. All the wiring may not have some of the tools and HOD1K Homing/Tracking Beeper Transmitter Kit ...... $49 .50 EASY ORDERUIG PROCEDURE TOLL FREE 1·800·221 ·1705 from the board to other parts of the possibly you are not aware of a few of or 24 HAS ON 1·603-673·4730 or FAX IT TO 1·603·672 ·5406 circuit were connected near the same VI SA. MC . CHECK . MO lN US FUNDS . INCLUDE 10"/o SHIPPING . ORDERS the tricks. Hopefully, some of the $100 .00 & UP ONLY ADD $10 .00 . CATALOG $1 .00 OR FREE WITH ORDER end so that I could fold out the board-for details here will have been helpful. In access to its underside and other com­ future segments we'll use this unit to . INFORMATION UNLIMITED ponents in the box. The 3 terminal check out some other interesting cir­ P 0 BOX 716, DEPT. ET2. AMHERST. NH 03031 regulator was mounted on the bottom of cuits. 0 Circle Reader Service Card No.58

Electronics & Technology Today Feb/March 1991 • 17