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Re: Car igntion coil
From: Edward V. Phillips[SMTP:ed-at-alumni.caltech.edu]
Sent: Friday, August 29, 1997 4:09 PM
To: tesla-at-pupman-dot-com
Subject: Re: Car igntion coil
"Hi this is my first post...
I'am an Italian coiler...I can't afford neon xfrm...in Italy a small 10 KV
10 mA
costss about 200$...so i decided to generate the HT for the primary of my
coil by two old car ignition coil...it's a strange way to obtain HV isn't
it?...Did anyone already tried it??? Any way it seems to not work as well
as i thought..."
Gabrielle:
Your english is fine. As for the matter of building Tesla
coils operated from automotive ignition coils, many of us have done
it with considerable succes. The biggest discharge I have been
able to get here is a little over 10 cm, using a 12 volt ignition
coil at an input of about 12 watts. Essentially the same coil, running
with a 14" diameter toroid made of 4" diameter ducting easily throws
24 inch sparks when excited with about 600 watts from a neon sign
transformer. Use what you have and enjoy it!
As for your low output, you didn't give us enough information
for anyone to make a useful comment. One thought is that you are
perhaps using a capacitor which is "too large for the coil", by
which I mean that it doesn't get charged to a high enough voltage
by the coil. In my case I use an 0.0047 mfd capacitor, which
breaks down a spark gap with a spacing of about 2.5 mm.
Good luck,
Ed