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Re: UV Radiation (fwd)
Subject: Re: UV Radiation (fwd)
Date: Fri, 16 May 1997 00:56:14 -0400 (EDT)
From: richard hull <rhull-at-richmond.infi-dot-net>
To: Tesla List <tesla-at-pupman-dot-com>
>If ones eyes are exposed to a reasonable amount of this radiation, they
>will find that the cornea turns a partially milky-opaque, perhaps
>further
>damaging the retina.
>
>A few people have told me many times not to have the spark-gap visible
>by
>the naked eye (basically completely shielded) during operation.
>
>How much radiation can be produced by the spark-gap and how dangerous is
>it?
>
>Has anyone got any ideas, suggestions, experiences etc with this topic?
>
>Well, happy coiling, and don't look at the spark-gap during arcing! :-)
>
>Catchya later!
>
>Rod
>
Rod,
I'm coming in late on this and other may have answered you already.
It is a matter of power disappated in the gap (some fraction of that
loss
goes into UV production) and distance from the gap to the hapless idiot
staring into it. (inverse square law.)
If you wear glasses all the time, (that are not pure quartz), you have
little to fear unless quite close to the gap and staring into it. Since
most of my stuff is high power and demoed to lots of visiting folks,
many of
them knee jerk, safety nerds, I cover the rotary from direct view and
force
folks to be 30 feet away from it while runing. I would recommend that
all
you coilers cover the gap in some fashion if you are going to show other
folks your stuff. You don't need some guy fresh outta' high school
physics
putting two and two together and coming up with "the sky is falling" in
front of a highly excitable assemblage of onlooking rubber necks. He'll
steal th' show and you'll have blubbering safety nerds to assuage,
molify,
and placate.
Richard Hull, TCBOR