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Straight Spark
Subject: Straight Spark
Date: Mon, 19 May 1997 08:13:43 -0400 (EDT)
From: tesla-at-america-dot-com (Bob Schumann)
To: tesla-at-pupman-dot-com
CC: USA-TESLA-at-list.usa-dot-net
Howdy coilers,
I am recently working on a baby coil and using the
6kv-at-23ma transformer and .005uf cap that came
originally with my Information Unlimited kit. I
made an inverted cone primary from house grouding wire
and would a new secondary on a polyethylene tube.
I am using a brass doorknob as my discharge terminal
since the system doesn't have that much power and the
sparks can easily 'breakout' from the brass doorknob.
The sparks 'run' around the brass sphere and I have
seen some nice banjo effects - probably from not being
in good tune. Everyting is thrown together and sits on
the floor. My spark gap is 3 3/4 inch diameter copper
tubes balanced on some insulators from an electric fence
setup. As I got closer in tune and couplings, I noticed a
very strange effect. The brass doorknob did have numerous
discharges running around it, but when I reached a certain
tuning point, all spark discharges came together as one.
The one spark had absolutely no branches. The spark was
perfectly straight and the only movement was at the very
end of the spark which had a small whip-like movement at
the very end. The spark stayed in place on the doorknob
for about 10 seconds and then broke back into the scattered
discharges running around the doorknob as previous. Has
anybody ever seen this effect? Why was the spark straight ?
I am going to see if I can re-create this at will (sorry Will)
and take some pics.
Bob Schumann
tesla-at-america-dot-com
http://www.america-dot-com/~tesla