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Re: breaking in caps (fwd)
---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Wed, 29 Apr 1998 15:42:32 -0500
From: Jeff Corr <corr-at-enid-dot-com>
To: Tesla List <tesla-at-pupman-dot-com>
Subject: Re: breaking in caps (fwd)
I agree totally... but worth the extra work? I'm not so sure...
>No one ever said you couldn't just throw a TC capacitor together and
>fire it up immediately and have it *work*.
>
>But if you desire to protect your investment and have it run for as long
>as possible, it is imperative that all air be excluded. All it takes
>is one air bubble to allow a localized corona to develop, and believe
>me, the corona will *eventually* degrade the poly to the point that
>the insulation will fail. The degradation is cumulative.
>
>Sometimes I just need a quickie capacitor for some experiment, such as
>tweaking the value of an existing cap so I can achieve proper
>resonance without having to make my primary coil larger, and I just
>cobble something together from scraps. I might not even use any oil.
>And it always works! But I KNOW that it is (as Malcolm put it so
>succinctly) doomed to fail.
>
>Is it worth it to make TC caps that will last quite a bit longer
>than ones that are just cobbled together? Yes.
>
>Are there times when all we want is for the darn thing to work *now*,
>and our attitude is "damn the torpedoes! Full speed ahead!!"?? You bet.
>
>Wisdom is knowing when to cobble and when to be patient and go the
>extra mile to make the thing bulletproof.