

What's this component? Was a national secret in the 1940s. - computator
http://whatisit.pen.io/

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computator
The OP here. I'll explain what it is later if no one cares to guess.

If you're interested in electronics, you probably know its name and purpose,
as I did. But it happens to be a little difficult to "extract". I had been
meaning to get my hands on one of these for ages. Finally got one!

What's so intriguing to me is that the internal _geometry_ is what makes it
function, and was (as I understand it) the genius involved in making the first
working version.

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slaxman
It's a magnetron. It what makes our microwave ovens work.

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computator
OP here again. That's what it is.

There are some good pictures of a cutaway of a magnetron here:

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cavity_magnetron>

It's kind of amazing that you can create microwaves with nothing more than a
high voltage, a magnet, and a cavity with precisely the right shape.

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mschuster91
It's a magnetron of course. AFAIK the "warming" effect of microwaves was
discovered by accidentally melt chocolate.

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omegant
Could a home microwave's magnetron be converted into an antenna? what possible
use could it have?, are they good for data transmission? the microwave
antennas I mean, not the ovens.. It could be cool to have a dyi super high
power wifi of some kind!

