I came into this thread a bit late. Am I to understand Tesla's patents are
online - somewhere? Many years ago - I was working at a gas station for a
mechanic who owned the place. He had a fascination with Tesla's work. He
mailed away to England (U.K.) I believe - and got like 10 of the patent
copies. I can't recall the cost to do that - but they were pretty damned
detailed and neat. I can't recall if he kept them or gave them to me. If I
have them, I have no clue where they're stashed. But they "were" neat!
US patents are online, via the US patent office. A websearch will turn
it up, I don't have the URL handy.
The problem there is that before a certain date, the patents were merely
scanned, so very few search options are available. If you have the
patent numbers, then it's easy. After about 1970, the patents were in
digital form to start with, so you can search on a lot more things.
Every so often, people come along and say "wow, with this site you
can get patents", but I'm not sure what they offer that isn't at
the US Patent Office website. Of course, if the patents weren't
filed in the US, they'd not be there. I don't know what other
countries do on the matter.
IN the old days, it was a big thing to get a hold of patents. The
average person didn't have the means of doing searches, and there'd
be a cost to get copies of the patents. Hence there'd be all those
multiple sources that offered copies of patents on various things.
Tesla has so much mystique built up around him, it was the sort
of thing you'd see ads for in the back of magazines. All those
lines about "the inventions the government has suppressed" makes
them a highly saleable item.
Michael
