Re: Aluminum wire in an NST

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

Original poster: "by way of Terry Fritz <twftesla-at-qwest-dot-net>" <Hollmike-at-aol-dot-com>

Hi all, 
   Just as a note,  Chip,  our list owner,  uses a (approx. 2 inch wide) 
aluminum strip cut from the end of a roll of flashing for his primary coil.    
It seems to work just fine, in spite of all a theory that says it should 
suck.  The 10+ foot streamers that his coil produces rival the output of any 
coil I have seen so far. 
  I think it works fine due to the large surface area.  It must alleviate 
any problems of lower conductivity.   As for contact resistance due to the 
oxide layer,  he taps his primary using a simple clamp(hemostats if I 
recall).    
   I only mention this, because this topic arises periodically and there is 
much discussion about how bad aluminum is as a conductor.   I think the gap 
losses are like an order of magnitude(or more?) higher than that caused by 
the resistivity of aluminum, or any conductor,  so the choice is not that 
critical.   Perhaps one reason not to use it for a primary coil is the size.   
Unless the coil is a very small one, the wire from a NST primary is likely 
too small -whether it is copper or aluminum. 
   my $0.02 
Mike