Planning a magnifier

["David L Wilson" <daveandcynthia-at-juno-dot-com> (by way of Terry Fritz <twftesla-at-uswest-dot-net>)]

Hi,

This is the first post I am sending to the list.  My name is Joshua
Wilson, from Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and I am 17 years old.  I have built
two small coils (under 2' spark) and am now constructing my first large
coil.  

I sent a post about a week ago, but I don't think it went through.  I was
writing about a good secondary design for a medium sized coil, but I
recently got a fairly good price quote on a pig, and I am now considering
buying that and converting my existing TC setup to a more powerful
magnifier.  I have a few questions, however, on how to go about doing
that.

First of all, the prices I got from T&R Electric on their pole pigs were
the same for all their pigs from 1 to 15 kVA.  I only need 2 kVA for my
purposes now, but as long as I'm paying the same for a 5 or a 10 kVA
unit, is there any reason why I shouldn't go with a more powerful pig
than what I need, in case I upgrade later?

The primary, extra coil, and rotary gap have already been completed
(using material from my previous coils), and I am still planning a good
secondary for the system.  I have searched the list archives extensively
for info on the capacitors, which has resulted in some confusion on my
part.  Some coilers claim that good homemade plastic bottle capacitors
work almost as good as the commercial caps - even in magnifier coils - 
while others insist that commercial caps are the only way to go in a
magnifier setup.  I am looking for a cap that will perform reasonably
well, without requiring that I blow hundreds of dollars in addition to
what I am already paying for my pig.  Does anyone know of a capacitor
type that would be good for me?  I guess the capacitance sort of depends
on the power of my input transformer, but the pigs are all rated at
24,940 V.  Sorry if I'm asking too many questions, but any help would be
much appreciated.

Thanks!

Joshua Wilson