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Re: Laser Triggered Spark Gap



Tesla List wrote:

> Original Poster: "B**2" <bensonbd-at-erols-dot-com>
>
> Hi Steve,
>     For the record the RQ style gap was invented by the TCBOR group.  The
> TCBOR videos make this abundantly clear.  It should be called the TCBOR gap
> to honor all of the members of that group that contributed to the evolution
> of the design.

...........................................

Thanks Barry for the recognition.  That is correct, Richard saw our
multi-series plenumed gaps both air blast and vacuum as well as our rolled
poly caps not only on our tapes but in 1992 when he attended our Teslathon.
Richard was one of the first coilers to hit the computer and pump it as a
medium of communication.  An avid and very suceessful coiler, he probably came
farther faster than any other coiler I have ever known.  One day he was makin'
his first coil and the next month he was getting 80" arcs.

I joked with Richard that I was not about to slave away at a computer and
virtually scoffed at his efforts as he was forced to post on an early BBS
which
was a home for un-conventional and often unscientific ideas. (there was no
Tesla net, list serv or readily usable internet for private people then.  It
was tedious 1200 baud modem time to bizarre bulletin boards at costly long
distance rates.  Richard posted his evaluations and construction tips anyway.
Ultimately those original posts were ported over to the www and internet.
(sometime in 94 or 95 I think?!)

Many internet coilers have no real contact with coil history via the classic
channels, such as TCBA NEWS or Tesla conventions, Teslathons, video tapes,
etc.
and Richard was one of the earliest contributors to this list, his posts were
grist for hungry minds and hands.  For many coilers, coiling is just an
internet thing.  The internet has really helped albeit with a virtual deluge
and often complete overload of information, misinformation and dis-information
leaving the indivdual to sift through what is wheat and what is chaff.  For
most of the mainstream folks in the US, the internet is a two year old
thing!!!

Richard posted early and with some of the finest advices on coiling both
passing on wisdom he had learned from others (always giving due credit) along
with his own techniques and thoughts.  He was a real booster for not only the
computer and internet, but the free circulation of knowledge.

I don't get too upset when I read about the RQ gap as the new folks on the
list
are just passing old posts around and they have not spread their wings much
farther than the computer room.

Some folks have already credited the TCBOR with putting the toroid on Tesla
coils.  I wrote an article for TCBA News recently where I noted that the first
toroids on coils were due to innovations by Bill Wysock and Dick Aurant!  Who
knows or remembers Dick Aurant!?  Bill's high profile systems in museums of
the
70's and 80's and his early demonstrations at Tesla Symposiums made the toroid
a desirable and fashionable item.  It was, of course, originally used for
corona control.

 All The TCBOR did was show that obscenely oversized toroids can, with proper
design, vastly improve a system's performance.  They weren't just for corona
control anymore.  All this was really a Tesla idea!!!  We just rediscovered
it.
The idea had either gotten lost or coilers of yesteryear just never picked up
on it.

Our magnifier work has really been our crowning achievement.  How many
magnifiers were in amateur operation prior to our early 1990 efforts?  How
many
folks can remotely locate a resonator coil and get 10 times its length in
output spark?  Names you might not associate with the TCBOR magnifier effort
are Alex Tajnsek, Dave Sharpe or Ron Beck or Bill Richards.  They are all part
of the effort and I am not totally responsible for much of anything except a
few ideas, some construction and communicating the ideas of the TCBORs effort.

Proper credit for anything innovative should always be properly acknowledged (
remember Tesla)  but only time will tell how the history will shake out.
Computer buffs dabbling in coils will only learn internet history.  Those who
mingle physically with others and interact with traveled and older coilers
will
hear the campfire tails told the old way by word of mouth where the humanity
enters coiling.

Pleased someone remembered their history,

Richard Hull, TCBOR

Where is RQ, we all miss his wit and commentary.  It was like he got married
and then died!
Hope he still snorts a blast of ozone now and then.  RH