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More Questions...



Has anyone ever had problems with there house wiring when running a 
coil?  When I plugged in my coil to do some testing, I noticed a flash in 
the corner of my eye.  I quickly unpluged the coil.  I then tried it 
again, to find that one of the electrical outlets in my basement was 
sparking when I plugged in the coil.  Our house isn't old, so I can't 
blame the problem on old house wiring.  It really scared me as I don't 
know if the other outlets in the house could have sparked.  Since then, 
I haven't fired.  The coil supply is only to 30 ma 15,000 V neons.  One 
of them has since died.

One more question... What type of sparks can I expect to get from my 
coil?  The specs are 1 30 ma 15000 V neon, output to two chokes, a safety 
gap, and the main rotary gap (Overkill, I know).  The cap is a salt water 
cap I built (well, threw together) out of as many bottle as I could find 
in my house.  Let's assume that I throw this cap out and get the correct 
rating.  The primary is 14 turns of Cu tubing, wound in a spiral at an 
incline of 25 degrees.  Secondary is wound on 6 inch PVC, sealed, capped, 
and wound with 880 turns of 22 AWG magnet wire.  With the cap I have now, 
I get 4 inch streamers, and huge 6 inch sparks to a grounded rod (yes I'm 
kidding about huge).  Is this due to my poor capacitor?  Does a heavy 
ground increase the output as well as make the coil safer and reduce 
interference?  Unfortunately, I wasn't able to get 6 inch thin wall PVC, 
and used schedule 40 instead.  Would this reduce the output so 
dramatically?  As always, input would be greatly appreciated!