Re: Spark-gap sparks vs. solid-state sparks

["Tesla list" <tesla-at-pupman-dot-com>]

Original poster: "Kennan C Herrick by way of Terry Fritz <twftesla-at-uswest-dot-net>" <kcha1-at-juno-dot-com>

Antonio (& all)-

[comments interspersed]:

On Sat, 28 Apr 2001 21:35:22 -0600 "Tesla list" <tesla-at-pupman-dot-com>
writes:
> Original poster: "Antonio Carlos M. de Queiroz by way of Terry Fritz 
> <twftesla-at-uswest-dot-net>" <acmq-at-compuland-dot-com.br>
> 
> Tesla list wrote:
> > 
> > Original poster: "Kennan C Herrick by way of Terry Fritz
> <twftesla-at-uswest-dot-net>" <kcha1-at-juno-dot-com>
> 
> > I think that the cause lies in the inertia of the air that the 
> spark must
> > push aside, i.e. heat up, for it (the spark) to advance.  As I 
> wrote,
> > that's the same mechanism that allows nuclear bombs to work (and 
> aren't
> > we thus in fine company?).
> 
> Humm... I would say that the heat is a consequence, not a 
> prerequisite.
> The current starts to flow first, and it's the current that heats
> the air. Certainly there is a positive feedback mechanism once the
> air starts to get hot, but without current there is no heating.
> (I don't see the relation to a nuclear bomb, that has nothing of
> electrical).

A consequence, of course; but my point is that the spark cannot progress
until the heating is accomplished.  That takes time and the time exists
because of the air's inertia.

As to the bomb, my tongue was in cheek a bit.  But the bombs do
critically depend on inertia, as do an infinite number of other things in
the Universe, of course, including regular bombs.  Inertia holds things
together long enough for the processes to work: thermal burning in the
case of conventional bombs and nuclear fission and/or fusion in the case
of nuclear ones.

Someone save me from this thesis by (successfully) proposing another!

> 
> >...
> > If my secondary's voltage rises to break-out in, say, 40 cycles 
> while a
> > comparable spark-gap-secondary's voltage rises in 2 cycles, then 
> the
> > exciting magnetic fields must rise by the same factor, of 1:20.  
> In order
> > to get that 20X increase in field rate-of-rise, one needs 20X the 
> current
> > in the primary--from 20X the voltage applied.  Of course, that 
> 20X
> > current doesn't get applied for very long; not nearly so long as 
> my ~7 ms
> > per spark for example (Otherwise, coilers would be moving from 
> California
> > in droves.).
> 
> I commented before on this question of rate of rise. Remember that 
> the
> energy transfer occurs in several oscillation cycles (at least one 
> full cycle for coupling coefficient=0.6). If the frequency
> of the oscillations is not changed, the current and voltage 
> amplitudes
> are limited by energy conservation, and the number of cycles has 
> little
> effect on the maximum rate of rise of voltage or current anywhere 
> in
> he Tesla coil circuit. The visible output of the coil depends 
> fundamentally on the energy available for each discharge, and 
> to a certain extend also on the number of discharges per second
> (the hot air, or ionized air, theories).
> 
> Antonio Carlos M. de Queiroz

As I see it, with a sufficiently high initial rate-of-rise (probably not
realizable with normal T.c.'s), merely the first 1/4 cycle of primary
flux, or part thereof, could raise the top electrode's voltage to the
break-out level.  If I can do it in 40 cycles and other, spark-gap, coils
can do it in 2 cycles then some other coil could do it in 1/4 cycle,
given sufficient primary flux.

Ken Herrick
> 
> 
> 
> 
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