Re: microwave oven capacitors

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

Original poster: "Michael H Nolley by way of Terry Fritz <twftesla-at-qwest-dot-net>" <nolleym-at-willamette.edu>

> > I was just curious, how lossy would you guess that these kind of caps
> would
> > be. I don't have a lot of cash, so an MMC is kind of out of the question.
> I
> > currently am using two 50 kV .002 uF plastic capacitor caps in parallel
> with
> > my 15kV 60mA NST. This is about 40% of what is should be for good
> resonance
> > Would a capacitor built out of these things allow my coil to perform
> better
> > than it is now despite their lossy dielectric?

    Microwave oven capacitors are unusable as tank capacitors, because
mylar is a very lossy
dielectric at the frequencies we work at.  I attempted to use them several
summers ago, and a chain of
20 of them (no small feat to get this many!) was so lossy that they acted
as a huge resistor, rather
than a capacitor.  They are, however, ok for doubler circuits, which is
what they are designed for.
  ---Mike