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Science Fair Award Winner

It's not every day we get requests for technical assistance from eighth graders, but when the call came to us from William Thompson, we were happy to oblige. A student at Hardey Preparatory School in Chicago with a decided bent for science and technology which he hopes to pursue in college, William was interested in creating some form of magnetic shielding project for his school's Science Fair. So William and his father, William Edward Thompson III, visited our offices and spoke with Chief Engineer Ed Kobek and Regional Manager Brad Friestedt.

Ed and Brad discussed electromagnetic shielding and our shielding material in general with the Thompsons, and demonstrated various cylinder shields utilizing CO-NETIC AA alloys. William asked us how a Helmholtz Coil Assembly operated, and, after we delved into that subject, the student decided to build his own Helmholtz Coil Assembly as the basis of his project.

The official name of his ambitious project was "Electromagnetic Field Mitigation: Flux Shunting Versus Eddy Current Cancellation". William built his coil using specifications we provided to him, which saved him quite a bit of research time. Then, using one of our Lab Kits, he created his own cylinders to demonstrate the Helmholtz. His project also included historical facts about the Helmholtz Coil Assembly and its creator, Herman Helmholtz, a German physicist who lived in the nineteenth century.

The Helmholtz Coil Assembly provides a uniform magnetic field, compensating for fluctuations of interfering field strength with time and distance, in which magnetic shield designs can be evaluated. William created a functional 24" model complete with its own variable power source transformer, earning him an Outstanding Certificate at the Science Fair. He and his project will now progress to the Chicago regional competition in March. We congratulate William on his efforts.

And who knows? Maybe someday you will find William Thompson putting his considerable talents to work for us as an employee of Magnetic Shield Corporation.