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Re: A few questions


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>From tesla-at-poodle.pupman-dot-com Mon Oct  7 08:06:04 1996
X-Authentication-Warning: poodle.pupman-dot-com: bin set sender to tesla using -f
Date: Sun, 6 Oct 1996 20:25:04 -0600
From: Tesla List <tesla-at-poodle.pupman-dot-com>
To: Tesla-list-subscribers-at-poodle.pupman-dot-com
Subject: A few questions
Reply-To: tesla-at-pupman-dot-com
Comment: Now running Red Hat 3.0.3 Picasso
Content-Length: 1231

>From kylechad-at-airmail-dot-netSun Oct  6 20:06:45 1996
Date: Sun, 6 Oct 1996 13:52:12 -0500
From: Kyle Chadwick <kylechad-at-airmail-dot-net>
To: "'tesla-at-pupman-dot-com'" <tesla-at-pupman-dot-com>
Subject: A few questions

Hi,
I am in the middle of making my first Tesla coil and I have a couple of
questions. Please answer as many as you can.

1. The plans I have say to take some insulation off the primary for the
tap. What is a tap?

In order to tune the primary tank circuit you either vary the capacitor, or
the inductance.  As variable capacitors of 0.005 at 12KV are hard to come by
the problem of tuning is solved by making a movable connection to the primary.

2. I need to adjust the spark gap until I get the largest arc, right?

Adjust spark gap distance to get smooth running.  Start with a small gap and
work up.  Its good to tune up on small spark gap and low power.  Dont make the
cap too large else the caps will blow.

3. For the terminal I going to use a Styrofoam ball wrapped in metal
duct tape, will that work?

This will work, but a toroid is better.

4. for the insulation on the secondary I am going to use three cans of
spray on acrylic spray, does it need more?

Cover secondary until smooth.  I used polyurathane clear resin that sets in
20 mintes after hardener is added.   Had to work fast.

5. the plans call for a 6000v transformer and a .005 uf cap, do you think
   that a 15kv neon light transformer and 12 wine cooler salt water caps
   would work?

Yes, but for more info take a look at 
  ftp://nic.funet.fi/pub/sci/electrical/tesla

There are some TC design computer programs there, and lots of other good stuff
to get you going.

6. It calls for a choke, but I thought because i have a neon light
transformer that I don't need it. Is that right?

Neon sign transformers usually burn out when put to use in TC applications.
You can get away with it if you keep the power low, but it is best to
protect with chokes.   Wind 30 turns of insulated wire around a 2" iron dust 
toroid.   Make two and connect to each HV output from the neon.   If you don't
have 2" cores then wind 300 turns of fine wire around 3/4" PVC pipe single 
layer.

7. I Am doing this for science fair, can you think of any problems or
questions that a Tesla coil will solve?

No, there just good fun.

Thank you so much for anwersing my questions.
				,Kyle Chadwick.





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