Seddon-Gillespie on 5th December 1956, is quite remarkable. It is a tiny lightweight device which can
produce electricity using a self-powered electromagnet and chemical salts. The working life of the device
before needing refurbishment is estimated at some seventy years with an output of about one kilowatt.
The operation is controlled by a transmitter which bombards the chemical sample with 300 MHz radio waves.
This produces radioactive emissions from the chemical mixture for a period of one hour maximum, so the
transmitter needs to be run for fifteen to thirty seconds once every hour. The chemical mixture is shielded by a
lead screen to prevent harmful radiation reaching the user. The patent, GB 763,062 is included in the
Appendix.
This generator unit includes a magnet, a tube containg a chemical mixture of elements whose nuclei becomes
unstable as a result of bombardment by short waves so that the elements become radio-active and release
electrical energy, the mixture being mounted between, and in contact with, a pair of different metals such as
copper and zinc, and a capacitor mounted between those metals.
The mixture is preferably composed of the elements Cadmium, Phosphorus and Cobalt having Atomic Weights
of 112, 31 and 59 respectively. The mixture, which may be of powdered form, is mounted in a tube of non-
conducting, high heat resistivity material and is compressed between granulated zinc at one end of the tube and
granulated copper at the other end, the ends of the tube being closed by brass caps and the tube being carried
in a suitable cradle so that it is located between the poles of the magnet. The magnet is preferably an electro-
magnet and is energised by the current produced by the unit. The transmitter unit which is used for activating
the generator unit may be of any conventional type operating on ultra-shortwave and is preferably crystal
controlled at the desired frequency.
The transmitter unit is of any suitable conventional type for producing ultra shortwaves and may be crystal
controlled to ensure that it operates at the desired frequency with the necessity of tuning. The quartz tube
containing the chemical mixture, works best if made up of a number of small cells in series. In other words,
considering the cartridge from one end to the other, at one end and in contact with the brass cap, there would
be a layer of powdered copper, then a layer of the chemical mixture, then a layer of powdered zinc, a layer of
powdered copper, etc. with a layer of powdered zinc in contact with the brass cap at the other end of the
cartridge. With a cartridge some forty five millimetres long and five millimetres diameter, some fourteen cells
may be included.
