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Re: Help PLEASE! So close.. and yet...
Tesla List wrote:
>
> Original Poster: "Yuri Markov" <wmondale-at-hotmail-dot-com>
>
> Well, I fired up my "not shooting for anything glorious" coil for the
> first time. I had a problem. The transformer, capacitor, spark gap,
> and whole tank circuit work perfectly. Real nice, cool sounding
> sparks in the gap, everything perfect. Only one slight detail - the
> secondary coil and discharge terminal did nothing. Absolutely
> nothing. I tried grounding the bottom to a well, and then directly to
> the house ground, to no avail. In case it helps: The power supply is
> 7500 volts at 30 milliamps(that's 220 watts). The capacitor is a
> leydan jar of an unknown capacitance. The primary is about five turns
> of really big fat copper stuff. As I said, that all works fine. The
> secondary is 30 AWG enamled magnet wire (the really thin red stuff -
> it was all I had) wound about 3/4 the height of a thin untreated
> cardbord wrapping paper tube (2 inches diameter). A softball wrapped
> nice and smoothly in aluminum serves as the discharge terminal. What
> is wrong? Is the cardboard conducting all the RF? Is the wire fatally
> thin? Help, please!
>
> -Yuri Markov, would-be coiler
>
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Are you in tune? A whole bunch of turns of #30 on a long thin form
would tend to imply fairly high inductance, therefore low resonant
frequency. Only 5 turns of primary seems a bit small, particularly with
a small Leyden jar capacitor.
Run the numbers and make sure that your LC for primary and LC for
secondary are at least in the ballpark with each other. #30 isn't great,
but it should still work.. However, how many zillion turns are there?
Then, put a grounded wire close to the secondary terminal (say, about
an inch away) and see if you get any discharge. If you do, then move the
primary tap each way about 1/4 turn and see if it changes. If not, move
the ground closer (say, to 1/2 inch).