DC powered tesla coil (fwd)

To: tesla-at-pupman-dot-com
Subject: DC powered tesla coil (fwd)
From: Tesla List <mod1-at-pupman-dot-com>
Date: Mon, 20 Jul 1998 22:12:48 -0600 (MDT)
Approved: mod1-at-pupman-dot-com

---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Mon, 20 Jul 1998 22:22:23 +0200
From: Max Di Tommaso <sistemi-at-mail.matav.hu>
To: tesla-at-pupman-dot-com
Subject: DC powered tesla coil

Hi all,
I just joined the list. As a beginner, I have my load of questions to
ask to you expert coilers (I confess, haven't built a working one yet!).

1. I was wondering about charging the tank cap with DC voltage supplied
by a neon transformer and a half or full-wave rectifier. This would
allow charging larger caps with smaller transformer because the spark
gap wouldn't fire 50 or 60 times per second but less frequently, let's
say every second. I guess that the peak power delivered to the coil
shouldn't be much different as it depends, IMO, on the peak voltage
before the spark gap fires and not how often this occurs. Is that
correct? Any other parameter unchanged, does the repetition rate of the
tank cap discharge affect the quality (lenght, brightness, etc) of the
streamers jumping out the toroid?

2. I happen to have some inductive ballast of the type used with
fluorescent tubes. Can they have any use in coiling (perhaps as RF
chokes)?

Thanks to everyone for any opinion. (English is not my native language,
so please excuse my mistakes).

Ciao

Max Di Tommaso