The main reason why he failed was that he was too busy. He practiced day and night, so how could he have the time to invent something?

Well, it’s definitely not that he is too ambitious and not cut out for scientific research…

However, as the saying goes, no effort is wasted. At least after a few years of hard work, he figured out all the technical difficulties and how to proceed. So in the fourth year of Wanli, when this glorious and arduous task was handed over to Zhang Jian, he clearly pointed out the direction and steps of the research!

First, Zhao Hao decided to bypass the wired telegraph and go directly to radio!

Although the wired telegraph was simpler in principle, long-distance transmission was a big problem, especially since it needed to cross several oceans. Just thinking about how to manufacture and lay tens of thousands of kilometers of cables was overwhelming.

Manufacturing is actually not that difficult. The group's wire drawing machines are already very mature and can supply barbed wire to the coast guard. Drawing tens of thousands of kilometers of copper wire is not difficult, at least technically.

Moreover, the gutta-percha used in the submarine cable can be extracted from eucommia gum. Or it is not difficult to find gutta-percha trees directly in the rain forests of Southeast Asia.

But the question is, how to lay these tens of thousands of kilometers of cables? On land, you need to build poles, and the rubber is wrapped around the copper wires! Wouldn't it be that if you lay the wires in front, someone will steal and cut them in the back?

Well, even if he risked his life and sent tens of thousands of people to guard the line, what about the submarine section? Although he didn't have to worry about people stealing it, with the current level of technology, he had no confidence that the rubber of tens of thousands of kilometers of wires would not crack at all. If there was a crack, the copper wire would come into direct contact with the seawater, the current would dissipate, and the communication would be interrupted. He didn't even know where to repair it.

Moreover, the massive effort to build telegraph lines was totally inconsistent with his "theory of finite generations". Wasn't it telling Europeans how to achieve long-distance communication?

Radio is much better. Small radio stations are extremely confidential, and as long as confidentiality regulations are strictly observed, it is possible to maintain confidentiality for a long time.

No matter how we keep it secret, our opponents will eventually figure it out in the future. We have a secret method for long-distance communication.

But you can also confuse snoopers by making it mysterious, for example, you can say that radio technology is the Taoist art of "transmitting sound over a thousand miles". If you want to learn it, you can find a Taoist temple to learn from a master...

This is Zhao Hao's original intention to name the Electromagnetic Research Institute the Taoism and Law Research Institute.

~~

How did radio technology come into being in another time and space?

It comes from the relay of several scientific greats who tortured middle school students. In 1820, Oersted discovered the physical phenomenon that electric current can generate magnetism.

Eleven years later, Faraday discovered the law of electromagnetic induction based on this.

Another 42 years later, Maxwell proposed the theory of electromagnetic fields and described some properties of electromagnetic waves, laying the theoretical foundation for the birth of radio.

Fifteen years later, Hertz discovered through experiments that applying high voltage to both ends of a coil would cause sparks to occur, and radio waves would be emitted from the sparks, which could cause a distant coil to generate current. This was the first time that radio waves were generated and received in a laboratory.

At this point, all the conditions for the emergence of radio were ripe, but unfortunately Hertz did not think of the great uses of radio and only published a paper on his research.

As a result, he was plucked away by Marconi from Italy within a few years... Of course, the Russians insisted that it was Popov who invented radio.

What Zhao Hao was going to restore was the spark transmitter invented by Popov.

Its structure is simple and does not require transistors, vacuum tubes, or any electronic components beyond the level of the 16th century. The required materials are completely within the manufacturing capabilities of the Xishan Island Research Center.

You only need to gather seven dragon balls to summon a dragon. You only need to gather seven parts to assemble a spark transmitter that can function normally and can send a message thousands of miles away.

The seven components are the key, battery, boost coil, capacitor, spark gap, antenna and ground wire.

When the key is closed, the strong current provided by the battery is converted into high voltage through the booster coil and loaded into the capacitor. The capacitor is connected to the metal balls at both ends of the spark ball. When the voltage loaded on the two metal balls on the spark gap by the two poles of the capacitor is high enough to break through the air gap, spark discharge is generated.

According to the principle of electromagnetic induction, spark discharge produces oscillating electromagnetic waves, which radiate outward through the antenna and become radio waves.

By controlling the length and interval of the closure of the electric key, long or short radio waves can be obtained. By encoding them according to certain rules, they can be used to transmit information. This is radio messaging.

The next step is how to produce the parts that meet the requirements one by one.

The electric key is the thing that the telegraph operator presses in movies and TV dramas. It is actually the power switch of the telegraph. The only difference is that the ordinary switch will not bounce when pressed, but the electric key will bounce when pressed and released. But there is no trick, it is nothing more than adding a reed under the key.

So the research team mastered the keypad very early, and now they are using the third generation. The beautiful brass keys are mounted on a rosewood keypad frame, with two feelers extending from under the keys, one in front and one behind. When you press half of the key, the front feeler contacts the contact point on the keypad frame; when you press all of the key, both feelers contact the contact point, so you can clearly distinguish the length of the signal.

~~

Then there are batteries, which are not difficult. Although dry batteries have not yet been made, wet batteries have a long history. The earliest can be traced back to 1,800 years ago, when people in Baghdad inserted an iron rod and a zinc cylinder into a clay pot filled with vinegar, which was able to convert chemical energy into electrical energy and was used for a long time.

Of course, the real battery is the voltaic pile invented by Volta in another time and space, that is, the battery pack.

He stacked silver and zinc plates together, separating them with wet cloth containing salt water. In this way, three plates formed a unit and generated an electric current that could be controlled and stored.

Although the voltage generated by a single unit is very low, he found through subsequent experiments that as long as the units are stacked in order, the current can be significantly increased. About six units in series can generate a voltage of 4 volts. This voltage is nothing in later generations, and it can be achieved by stringing together several small batteries, but it can already provide enough electricity for scientific experiments.

Middle school physics knowledge tells us that although Volt invented the battery and got the right to name voltage, his understanding of the principle of power generation was wrong. It is not the case that two metals can generate electricity by contacting each other. In fact, metals react chemically with salt water. Therefore, it would be much better to directly insert zinc and silver rods into the electrolyte.

Zhao Hao originally planned to let Zhang Jian and his team use this improved tank voltaic battery to supply power. He took it for granted that if the voltage was low, he could just connect a dozen or twenty more units in series, and the requirement would always be met.

However, the team found in actual applications that the power generation of the voltaic battery was far from the theoretical value, and the battery voltage would gradually decrease until it was completely scrapped.

After research, Xu Guangqi discovered that during the operation of the battery, many bubbles would gather on the silver rod. As the reaction continued, more and more bubbles appeared, and the battery simultaneously lost its ability to discharge.

He speculated that these bubbles hindered the diffusion of charge in the battery, causing the battery to fail. He collected these bubbles and found that they were actually hydrogen. He was even more afraid to use this kind of battery again.

With so many batteries working together, if the ventilation is not done well, the hydrogen released will accumulate and the spark generator will produce a spark, and everyone will be cremated directly...

The solution he came up with was to insert two metal rods into different electrolytes and use another electrolyte to consume the hydrogen produced by the zinc reaction.

After repeated experiments, Xu Guangqi invented a double-liquid battery. This battery has a cylindrical ceramic shell, a smaller cylindrical hollow glass cylinder inside, and the bottom of the cylinder is tied tightly with pig skin.

He injected copper sulfate solution into the inner tank and inserted a copper rod, and injected zinc sulfate solution into the outer tank and inserted a zinc rod. The two electrolytes were connected through a natural semipermeable membrane, pig intestines.

This battery not only solved the problem of the voltage drop of the voltaic battery, but also could be recharged and used repeatedly, so it was also a storage battery. It was a great improvement, and Zhao Hao happily named it the "Guangqi Battery"!

The power for this experiment was provided by eight cans of Light-Chi batteries connected in series.

~~

The third one is the booster coil. This is simple, just winding the coil. Mr. Zhao had done this when he was in school, so he was very confident about this step. The primary coil has very few turns, and twenty turns of rubber wire are enough. The secondary coil wire should be as thin as possible so that it can be wound a few more times.

According to the principle of electromagnetic induction, in theory, the multiple of the number of turns is the multiple of the voltage amplification. About 20,000 turns would be enough. Of course, he gave up halfway, and the institute spent three full years to produce a sufficiently thin rubber wire.

The fourth is the capacitor that stores high voltage electricity.

This step is ready-made, because the Leyden jar that is so popular in science exhibition halls is a primitive but effective high-voltage capacitor.

Xu Guangqi also designed an oil-impregnated paper dielectric capacitor that was made by stacking oil paper and tin foil and then sealing it with paraffin, but it was still being improved. This time, in order to be foolproof, the Leyden jar was used again.

The fifth is the spark gap, which is even simpler - two small copper balls only a few centimeters apart. Xu Guangqi added a slide to one of the balls, and by turning a wooden bolt on the side, he could change the distance between the copper balls, thereby changing the transmission power.

As for the sixth antenna… it’s even simpler than a spark gap, so there’s nothing much to say. The longer it is, the better.

The seventh bottom line is to tie a copper plate to the wire, bury it in the ground, and you're done.

Zhao Hao always felt that since he had mastered five of the seven components by himself, he could be called the father of radio.

But he saw that in addition to the seven pieces, there was another device on the table - two spiral copper strips coiled like mosquito coils, installed on an insulated wooden shaft. One coil was connected to the antenna and the bottom line, and the other coil was connected to the capacitor and the spark gap.

The eighth component added by Xu Guangqi is an adjustable inductor, which can fix the frequency of electromagnetic waves at a certain value to achieve confidentiality and selectivity of communication. This is something Zhao Hao had never thought of before.

After careful consideration, Mr. Zhao decided to give the title of the Father of Radio to Xu Guangqi.

Then I am the grandfather of radio, which is not bad...