First Coil Confusion

To: "'Tesla List'" <tesla-at-poodle.pupman-dot-com>
Subject: First Coil Confusion
From: Tesla List <tesla-at-stic-dot-net>
Date: Sun, 9 Nov 1997 22:55:39 -0600
Approved: tesla-at-stic-dot-net

From: 	Alex Parker[SMTP:axparker-at-javanet-dot-com]
Sent: 	Sunday, November 09, 1997 7:11 PM
To: 	tesla-2-at-emachine-dot-com
Cc: 	tesla-at-pupman-dot-com
Subject: 	First Coil Confusion

Hi all,

	Excuse me while I raise a question which has probably been asked to death.
Despite the enormous amounts of literature, schematics, and books I've read
on Tesla coils, I have yet to find one that gives detailed instructions on
how to wire the whole apparatus together. I have recently completed the
construction of all my coil parts, and I attempted to wire them together in
what I thought was the correct way, according to the schematics that I
have. When I turned on the juice, the spark gap immediately started firing,
stinking up my basement and waking up the neighbors. I let the thing run
for a full 5 seconds, but no spark issued forth from the terminal, or any
part of the coil other than the gap. Being a beginner to the HV field, and
the electronics field in general, I haven't got the slightest clue what
might be going wrong. Here are my questions:

My plans say that the capacitor should be connected in parallel across the
HV legs of the transformer. Does this mean that I should have 2 leads going
into the capacitor, and two leads going out; or a 2 lead cap with each one
of it's lead's across one of the HV legs? Also, I am in the dark about how
the secondary coil is connected to the rest of the circuit, or if it is
connected to the rest of the circuit at all. If anyone could take the time
to explain the wiring to me, or knows where I can find some DETAILED
instructions, it would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks for listening.