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Now, How does a coil really work??
Hello all,
After reading some of the comments on my post about a TC coil not experiencing
resonant rise (spark length increase is due to the resonant rise), I have
become more confused than ever.
I will believe that the primary circuit experiences LC resonance (that is what
we want, if I understand it correctly) and that this will increase the amount
of energy available in the primary in comparison to a single shot from the cap
to the primary coil w/o resonance (i.e: a simple discharge of a charged cap
into a certain coil with little or no LC resonance occuring).
I will also believe that in order to transfer as much energy as possible you
will want the secondary to resonate at the same FRes as the primary.
However, the way I understand resonant rise (maybe this is incorrect ??) is
that the output energy of the coil will be greater than what you "stuff" into
the primary. This would violate the energy conservation laws and I donīt see
how this is possible.
I can not see how you can store a charge on the coil (alone). The toroid is a
totally different matter. Cself is so small, that it canīt hold any kind of
reasonable charge for a length of time. The toroid, on the other hand, is able
to do so. The bigger the toroid, the greater the voltage is, that can be
stored on it (i.e. longer sparks) before breakout will occur. This, of course,
has limits. If your toroid is so big that a breakout canīt occur, then you
will have a losing situation.
So the way I see it is:
The bigger CToroid is, the less often you will experience a real arc (to
something grounded), but the longer and more powerful this arc will be.
The way I read some of the answers is that you can store a charge on the coil
itself (which has to be a very small amount).
However, as soon as breakout occurs, you will lose this (and some of the
energy stored in the toroid) into making your sparks and it takes quite a
while (compared to the total time of one complete energy transfer cycle)
before a new secondary "charging" cycle takes place. So, what I donīt
understand is how can the stored energy from one cycle be carried over to the
next one?
Another one of my question to the "resonant believers" is:
If resonant rise does occur, why doesnīt the output (spark length) of an
unloaded (!!) coil continue to grow the longer the coil operates? Of course
there would be a limit to this, but any (unloaded) coil should experience very
short streamers that will (have to) grow in length the longer the coil runs. I
have never seen this happen.
I do not mean that some arcs or streamers are longer than others. Resonance
rise would force MOST streamers to continue to grow in length. Esp. since the
energy needed to keep a streamer alive is less than is needed to let a new
streamer form. In other words: when you plug in your coil you start out with a
streamer of say 10". After a minute of running, this streamer would be (e.g.)
20" long, etc. Plus a coil experiencing resonant rise shouldnīt experience the
dramatic differences in arc length (loaded vs unloaded).
The experience with my (unloaded) coil has been that I get a (or multiple)
streamer(s) of 20" and this length does NOT vary all too great. The streamer
will connect to a grounded rod now and then (which is a little further away
~2"), but if I place the grounded rod say an additional 2-4" away, the
streamer will never (!!) connect to it. If resonance rise DOES occur, it
should do this after a while, but it doesnīt.
A loaded coil will do this (growing arc or streamer length) to some extend,
but I believe this is due to the fact that voltage is being stored on the
toroid (!) and
slowly building up, before finally discharging.
What am I missing I.e. why do some guys (even experienced coilers) say a TC
encounters resonant rise?
More confused than ever before,
Coiler greets from germany,
Reinhard