Re: Alternative capacitor materials

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

Original poster: "zachary rohrer by way of Terry Fritz <teslalist-at-qwest-dot-net>" <zcroh-at-comcast-dot-net>

A few more silly questions from a beginner...

Has anyone tried using paraffin or a paraffin/oil potting compound
instead of the mineral oil floating on top of the electrolyte in a
saltwater cap(so as to make a spillproof/more durable cap)?

Is there any chance of improving the "lossy" characterisitcs of glass by
coating it with a thin layer of something else, possibly PE or the like?
A thin layer could be layered on by dipping in molten PE or PE/wax
compound. Or even a coat of polyurethane? Would anything be gained by this?

Also, are there any readily available kinds of tubing that have a high
dielectric rating to make HV wire with? I haven't found a listing for
clear vinyl tubing's puncture voltage yet. If anyone knows this please
tell me.




On Tue, 2002-12-31 at 15:30, Tesla list wrote:
 > Original poster: "Rob Judd by way of Terry Fritz
<teslalist-at-qwest-dot-net>" <canska-at-a5-dot-com>
 >
 > Terry, actually the link to order them is
 >
 > http://www.thegeekgroup-dot-org/mmc with the mmc part lowercase :-)
 >
 > Its case sensitive, so the /MMC won't work!
 >
 > Rob Judd - canska-at-a5-dot-com
 > The Geek Group Web Monkey
 >
 >
 > ----- Original Message -----
 > From: "Tesla list" <tesla-at-pupman-dot-com>
 > To: <tesla-at-pupman-dot-com>
 > Sent: Tuesday, December 31, 2002 12:29 PM
 > Subject: Re: Alternative capacitor materials
 >
 >
 >  > Original poster: "Terry Fritz" <teslalist-at-qwest-dot-net>
 >  >
 >  > Hi Zack,
 >  >
 >  > caps made from HDPE are pretty out of style these days.
 >  >
 >  > Now days, everyone tends to build either a salt water bucket cap like
 > this:
 >  >
 >  > http://thegeekgroup-dot-org/projects/bucketcap/
 >  >
 >  > Which is very inexpensive.
 >  >
 >  > Or They make a modern MMC style cap out of many special high
current caps
 >  > like this:
 >  >
 >  > http://thegeekgroup-dot-org/projects/MMC/
 >  >
 >  > Caps like this can be ordered and there is a chart about how many
you need
 > at:
 >  >
 >  > http://thegeekgroup-dot-org/MMC/
 >  >
 >  > More data at:
 >  >
 >  > http://hot-streamer-dot-com/TeslaCoils/MMCInfo/mmcinfo.htm
 >  >
 >  > Or search the web for "MMC capacitor Tesla".
 >  >
 >  > Cheers,
 >  >
 >  >          Terry
 >  >
 >  > At 02:20 PM 12/30/2002 -0500, you wrote:
 >  > >  I have recently joined the list and intend to start building a tesla
 >  > >coil. Building capacitors is one of my big priorities right now as it
 >  > >seems to be one of the more time consuming and expensive items to
make.
 >  > >
 >  > >Has anyone tried making bottle type caps out of 5 Gallon buckets? (the
 >  > >type drywall mud comes in) They are made of HDPE aproximately .090" -
 >  > >.100" thick and are 12.25" tall (with about 9" usable electrolyte
depth)
 >  > >and 10.375" od at the bottom.
 >  > >
 >  > >Some questions I have are:
 >  > >
 >  > >What would be the capacitance of each bucket?
 >  > >How big a disadvantage would the single layer wall construction be?
 >  > >What type of electrolyte (cheap) would be best?
 >  > >Would the pigment(if any, the buckets I am planning to use are white)
 >  > >affect performance?
 >  > >
 >  > >I admit these would be very bulky.
 >  > >Is there a better way i could spend my time and money for a capacitor?
 >  > >
 >  > >any comments or suggestions would be appreciated
 >  > >thanks, zack.
 >  >
 >  >
 >  >
 >
 >