Re: AMRAD Spark Gaps

["Tesla list" <tesla-at-pupman-dot-com>]

Original poster: "Dr. Duncan Cadd by way of Terry Fritz <twftesla-at-uswest-dot-net>" <dunckx-at-freeuk-dot-com>

Date: 25 December 2000 04:27
Subject: Re: AMRAD Spark Gaps


Hi Luc et al!

>Original poster: "Luc by way of Terry Fritz
<twftesla-at-uswest-dot-net>" <ludev-at-videotron.ca>
>
>Hi Terry
>
>I remember reading that they used mica gaskets in most of
old quench spark gap.
>
>Luc Benard
>


So they did.  And so did I when I built mine.  A real pain.
A right royal major pain.  Mine started out as two inch
diameter disks 1/16 inch thick.  With an 80 tooth-per-inch
piercing saw I converted them to washers.  With a sheet of
sandpaper stapled to a piece of wood I sanded them down to
around 1 - 1,1mm thin.  Lost some fingerprints and blood in
the process.  With my Unimat 3 and a grindstone I got them
very nearly flat and parallel.  I started with 40 disks.  I
got 15 or so washers.  I smeared silicone high vacuum grease
(stable to over 200C) on them to seal them against the gaps.

They *still* leak ;-)

Webpage coming "real soon now" but probably not this year
:-)

Dunckx