Early electric fans • Hacker News Board

Re: Early electric fans

#11

Post by tompic823 » Thu, Jun 11, 2020, 5:56 AM UTC

It's fascinating that desk fans have had such a consistent design for over 100 years. Most surprising to me is that they've been able to oscillate for that long, too (since 1904!):

> Direct current desk fans were added in 1899. After acquiring a patent from Charles Eck for an oscillating fan mechanism, R&M put into production their unique DC "lollipop" oscillator in 1904, followed a few years later by an AC version. A sheet brass disk in front of the fan was acted upon by the air from the fan causing the fan to oscillate back and forth. Stops on the base of the fan were contacted by a pin at the bottom of the lollipop shaft to shift the disc to the other side, resulting in the fan oscillating to the other side.

Re: Early electric fans

#12

Post by kevin_thibedeau » Thu, Jun 11, 2020, 6:14 AM UTC

freefal wrote: post #4

Wow, the combination of those heavy metal blades and the sparsely placed safety bars definitely doesn't look finger friendly!

The kids were already electrocuted by the Edison sockets.

Re: Early electric fans

#13

Post by blueblisters » Thu, Jun 11, 2020, 6:36 AM UTC

fortran77 wrote: post #5

It's amazing anyone from this era had all 10 fingers.

I don't know about the torque on the desk fans. But modern ceiling fans have very low torque and kinetic energy: you will probably get away with sticking your hand into one of them with very little damage.

Re: Early electric fans

#14

Post by oldlinux » Thu, Jun 11, 2020, 6:47 AM UTC

These fans were certainly a luxury item for the time. The average price listed there was about $30. Adjusting for inflation, that's the equivalent of about $750 today (https://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=inflation+since+1911+f...).

Put another way, it was a few weeks worth of the average salary for a railway or steel worker of the era (https://ahundredyearsago.com/2012/09/17/average-salaries-191...).

Re: Early electric fans

#15

Post by Animats » Thu, Jun 11, 2020, 7:16 AM UTC

rrauenza wrote: post #10

If you're a fan of fans and of Technology Connections, there is an episode where he talks about older fans and why high is the first setting: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hQ3GW7lVBWY

Yes, a long discussion of the starting problems of electric motors. That was Tesla's real contribution to motor design - he came up with effective ways to get AC motors started under load.

Re: Early electric fans

#16

Post by Cthulhu_ » Thu, Jun 11, 2020, 7:48 AM UTC

oldlinux wrote: post #14

These fans were certainly a luxury item for the time. The average price listed there was about $30. Adjusting for inflation, that's the equivalent of about $750 today ( https://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=inflation+since+1911+f... ). Put another way, it was a few weeks worth of the average salary for a railway or steel worker of the era ( https://ahundredyearsago.com/2012/09/17/average-salaries-191... ).

Even Dyson's overpriced fans aren't THAT expensive nowadays.

That said, I do think there is a market for quality products in a 10-20x price range, products built to last instead of built to be cheap and good enough for a couple years.

Re: Early electric fans

#17

Post by Cthulhu_ » Thu, Jun 11, 2020, 7:49 AM UTC

freefal wrote: post #4

Wow, the combination of those heavy metal blades and the sparsely placed safety bars definitely doesn't look finger friendly!

I bet the cages nowadays were the result from a lawsuit. A lot of safety precautions (and warnings) are from that. I'm not knocking it, people do need to be protected from themselves (and accidents), I'm objecting to the massive damages lawsuits.

Re: Early electric fans

#18

Post by jayd16 » Thu, Jun 11, 2020, 8:37 AM UTC

freefal wrote: post #4

Wow, the combination of those heavy metal blades and the sparsely placed safety bars definitely doesn't look finger friendly!

Yes, it seems more like an open air blender than a fan.

Re: Early electric fans

#19

Post by rrmm » Thu, Jun 11, 2020, 9:25 AM UTC

ChuckMcM wrote: post #8

I love this: " My interests are with original and unrestored desk fans made prior to 1916. " Since they were invented in 1885 that is basically a 30 year window for a fairly expensive consumer good that probably sold in the neighborhood of a few thousand units. There is something wonderful about diving deeply into a particular kind of thing from a particular time. My Dad has a cap gun collection with a similar narrow…

Connoisseurship can make about anything interesting!

That said I love fans. I especially love those big old fans that seem to have a speed setting of 'menacingly slow'.

Re: Early electric fans

#20

Post by lqet » Thu, Jun 11, 2020, 9:44 AM UTC

> A sheet brass disk in front of the fan was acted upon by the air from the fan causing the fan to oscillate back and forth

Is this an accurate description? Here is such a fan in action:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cm7DFuGaujg

It seems to work because the brass disk is blocking the air stream on one side, so the other side of the fan acts as a jet engine to rotate it, which is actually really clever.