Re: Licence to thrill- TCs and computers

["Tesla list" <tesla@xxxxxxxxxx>]

Original poster: Steve Conner <steve@xxxxxxxxxxxx>

That was an interesting story. Particularly-

>Nor will laptops, because, says Wiseman, "anyone in the front three 
rows >wouldn't have a hard disk left. The field would wipe it straight away

I'm glad my laptop never knew about that ;) I have had it sitting about 2ft 
from the primary coil on my DRSSTC, and in fact connected to the DC bus 
(via some 100:1 scope probes and a PicoScope DSO module) while letting off 
3 foot arcs. Not only did the hard disk survive, but the wireless network 
card didn't even drop the link :-o

It logged a lot of useful data although it did reboot once following a 
heavy ground strike. The PicoScope went crazy and gave garbage data at the 
first whiff of corona, until I wrapped it in tin foil and put ferrite rings 
on all the leads. Also, the laptop and scope module were run off batteries 
to avoid ground currents, which probably helped a lot.

Don't try this at home, and don't blame me if you trash a new laptop :-o 
Mine is >8 years old and on its way out.

Steve Conner