Editing Electrostatic generator (section)

=====Pidgeon machine=====
In 1898, the [[Pidgeon machine]] was developed with a unique setup by [[W. R. Pidgeon]]. On October 28 that year, Pidgeon presented this machine to the Physical Society after several years of investigation into influence machines (beginning at the start of the decade). The device was later reported in the ''Philosophical Magazine'' (December 1898, pg. 564) and the ''Electrical Review'' (Vol. XLV, pg. 748). A Pidgeon machine possesses fixed electrostatic inductors arranged in a manner that increases the electrostatic induction effect (and its electrical output is at least double that of typical machines of this type [except when it is overtaxed]). The essential features of the Pidgeon machine are, one, the combination of the rotating support and the fixed support for inducing charge, and, two, the improved insulation of all parts of the machine (but more especially of the generator's carriers). Pidgeon machines are a combination of a Wimshurst Machine and Voss Machine, with special features adapted to reduce the amount of charge leakage. Pidgeon machines excite themselves more readily than the best of these types of machines. In addition, Pidgeon investigated higher current "triplex" section machines (or "double machines with a single central disk") with enclosed sectors (and went on to receive British Patent 22517 (1899) for this type of machine).

Multiple disk machines and "triplex" electrostatic machines (generators with three disks) were also developed extensively around the turn of the 20th century. In 1900, [[F. Tudsbury]] discovered that enclosing a generator in a metallic chamber containing [[compressed air]], or better, [[carbon dioxide]], the [[Electrical insulation|insulating properties]] of compressed gases enabled a greatly improved effect to be obtained owing to the increase in the breakdown voltage of the compressed gas, and reduction of the leakage across the plates and insulating supports. In 1903, [[Alfred Wehrsen]] patented an [[ebonite]] rotating disk possessing embedded sectors with button contacts at the disk surface. In 1907, [[Heinrich Wommelsdorf]] reported a variation of the Holtz machine using this disk and inductors embedded in celluloid plates (DE154175; "[[Wehrsen machine]]"). Wommelsdorf also developed several high-performance electrostatic generators, of which the best known were his "Condenser machines" (1920). These were single disk machines, using disks with embedded sectors that were accessed at the edges.