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Re: Neons....Paralell or Series?
From: Adam[SMTP:absmith-at-tiac-dot-net]
Sent: Friday, November 28, 1997 12:02 AM
To: Tesla List
Subject: Re: Neons....Paralell or Series?
>I would recomend measuring the voltage output from each neon sign
>transformer and only parallel them if they are within less than 1
>killovolt of each other. To measure their output voltage you will need to
>convert their output to D.C. and measure with a divider probe. I would
>suggest using say a 1B3GT tube to rectify the output and use either a
>V.T.V.M. with a high voltage probe or see if you can find a H.V. meter for
>T.V. Ultor usage.
Actually, I would not recommend attempting to rectify the voltage. You
still should use a divider, but measure with an oscilloscope or AC
voltmeter. Rectifying and smoothing out 15kV AC enough to use a DC meter
is not an easy or cheap thing to do :-)
>> Also, can I series link two neons or does this put 30kv through each
>> winding and kill them?
>
>Actualy the 30 Kv is spread out across both windings but still it can be a
>strain for a neon sign transformer, your much better off paralleling them.
>I've already hooked up to 6 in parallel with excellent results.
If they have center tapped secondaries, and you put them in series with
the case grounds connected together, you will get a 15kV 30mA transformer
that weighs twice as much :-) You'd be shorting out one winding on each
of the transformers. If you isolate the cases and connect one high
voltage output from each transformer to ground, the cases will be 7.5kV
hot with respect to ground and 15kV with respect to each other... not a
safe situation!!!!!!!
In other words, use them in parallel for 15kV -at- 60mA. Besides, you would
not want 30kV for tesla use, you would just be making insulating of the
components unnecessarily difficult.
-Adam
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