rotary question

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

Original poster: "bob golding by way of Terry Fritz <twftesla-at-uswest-dot-net>" <yubba-at-clara-dot-net>

Hi All,
    My rotary is coming along OK. I am wondering about the advantages,
or not, of having the electrodes side by side rather than end to end. I
am trying to design a fail safe system to allow the static electrodes to
be pushed out of the way in the event of a collision. I don't know if it
will work yet but the idea is to adjust the electrode spacing so that
they just touch then back off  .020 thou. I know the rotary electrodes
might  get pushed sideways as the rotor speeds up so the idea is to try
and set the gap so that it is 0.20thou at 3000 rpm. This would be easier
to do if the electrodes are side on. I remember someone (Bart?) playing
with something similar using copper tubes. Is there any advantage to
having them side on. I will try it with something less expensive and
brittle than tungsten first to see if the idea works.
cheers
bob golding